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THE  LIBRARY 

OF 

THE  UNIVERSITY 

OF  CALIFORNIA 

LOS  ANGELES 


FROM  THE  LIBRARY  OF 
ERNEST  CARROLL  MOORE 


^P  3ran  |)ap 

THE   LAST  MILLION.     How  They  Invaded  France  — 
and  England. 

ALL  IN  IT:   K  I  CARRIES  ON. 
PIP;  A  ROMANCE  OF  YOUTH. 
GETTING  TOGETHER. 
THE  FIRST  HUNDRED  THOUSAND. 
SCALLY:  THE  STORY  OF  A  PERFECT  GENTLE- 
MAN.    With  frontispiece. 
A  KNIGHT  ON  WHEELS. 

HAPPY-GO-LUCKY.  Illustrated  by  Charles  E.  Brock. 
A  SAFETY  MATCH.     With  frontispiece. 
A   MAN'S    MAN.     With  frontispiece. 
THE  RIGHT  STUFF.     With  frontispiece. 

HOUGHTON  MIFFLIN  COMPANY 
Boston  and  New  York 


THE  LAST  MILLION 


The  Last  Million 

How  They  Invaded  France 
—  and  England 

BY 

IAN  HAY 


BOSTON  AND  NEW  YORK 
HOUGHTON  MIFFLIN  COMPANY 

1919 


COPYRIGHT,    I9I9,    BY    IAN    HAY    BEITH 
ALL   RIGHTS   RESERVED 


TO 
THAT  BORN  FIGHTER 

AND 
MODERN  CRUSADER 

THE  AMERICAN  DOUGHBOY 


1607116 


CONTENTS 

A  Word  to  the  Dedicatee       .      .      .      .  ix 

I.  The  Argonauts 1 

II.  Ship's  Company 10 

III.  The  Lower  Deck 21 

IV.  The  Danger  Zone 29 

V.  Terra  Incognita 36 

VI.  Social  Customs  of  the  Islands     ...  46 

VII.  Three  Musketeers  in  London      ...  58 

VIII.  The  Promised  Land 78 

IX.  The  Exiles 91 

X.    S.O.S.  TO  DiLLPICKLE 104 

XI.  The  Line 125 

XII.  Chasing  IMonotony 138 

XIII.  An  Excursion  and  an  Alarum       .      .      .  148 

XIV.  The  Forest  of  the  Argonne   ....  164 
XV.  The  Eleventh  Hour 174 

XVI.  Gallia  ViCTRix 193 


A  WORD  TO  THE  DEDICATEE 

[Note:  The  following  is  the  substance  of  a  little  "  Welcome" 
which  the  author  was  requested  to  write  to  American  sol- 
diers and  sailors  visiting  England  for  the  first  time  during 
the  fateful  days  of  1918.  It  was  distributed  upon  the  trans- 
ports and  in  various  American  centres  in  England.  Its 
purpose  is  to  set  forth  some  of  our  national  peculiarities  — 
and  incidentally  the  author's  Confession  of  Faith.  It  has 
no  bearing  upon  the  rest  of  the  story,  and  mxiy  he  shipped 
by  the  reader  without  compunction.] 

I.  A  Word  of  Explanation 

I  write  this  welcome  to  you  American  soldiers  and 
sailors  because  I  know  America  personally  and  therefore 
I  know  what  the  word  "welcome  "  means.  And  I  see  right 
away  from  the  start  that  it  is  going  to  be  a  difficult 
proposition  for  us  over  here  to  compete  with  America 
in  that  particular  industry.  However,  we  mean  to  try, 
and  w^e  hope  to  succeed.  Anyway,  we  shall  not  fail  from 
lack  of  good-will. 

Having  bid  you  welcome  to  our  shores,  I  am  next 
going  to  ask  you  to  remember  just  one  thing. 

We  are  very,  very  short-handed  at  present.  During 
the  past  four  years  the  people  of  the  British  Isles  have 
contributed  to  our  common  cause  more  than  six  million 
soldiers  and  sailors.  On  a  basis  of  population,  the  purely 
British  contribution  to  the  forces  of  the  British  Empire 
should  have  been  seventy-six  per  cent.  The  actual  con- 
tribution has  been  eighty-four  per  cent;  and  when  w^e 
come  to  casualties,  not  eighty-four  but  eighty-six  per 


X     A  WORD  TO  THE  DEDICATEE 

cent  of  the  total  have  been  borne  by  those  two  little 
islands,  Great  Britain  and  Ireland,  which  form  the 
cradle  of  our  race.  You  can,  therefore,  imagine  the  strain 
upon  our  man-power.  Every  man  up  to  the  age  of  fifty 
is  now  Hable  to  be  drafted.  The  rest  of  our  male  popula- 
tion —  roughly  five  millions  —  are  engaged  night  and 
day  in  such  occupations  as  shipbuilding,  coal-mining, 
munition-making,  and  making  two  blades  of  corn  grow 
where  one  grew  before.  They  are  assisted  in  every 
department,  even  in  the  war  zone,  by  hundreds  and 
thousands  of  devoted  women. 

So  we  ask  you  to  remember  that  the  England  which 
you  see  is  not  England  as  she  was,  and  as  she  hopes  to 
be  again.  You  see  England  in  overalls;  all  her  pretty 
clothes  are  put  away  for  the  duration.  Some  day  we 
hope  once  again  to  travel  in  trains  where  there  is  room 
to  sit  down;  in  motor  omnibuses  and  trolley  cars  for 
which  you  have  not  to  wait  in  line.  We  hope  again  to 
see  our  streets  brightly  Ht,  our  houses  freshly  painted, 
flower  boxes  glowing  in  every  window,  and  fountains 
playing  in  Trafalgar  Square.  We  hope  to  see  the  city 
once  again  crowded  with  traffic  as  thick  as  that  on  Fifth 
Avenue  at  Forty-second  Street,  and  the  uncanny  silence 
of  our  present-day  streets  banished  by  the  cheerful  tur- 
moil of  automobiles  and  taxis.  And  above  all  we  hope  to 
see  the  air-raid  shelters  gone,  and  the  hundreds  of  crip- 
pled men  in  hospital  blue  no  longer  visible  in  our  streets, 
and  the  long  lines  of  motor  ambulances,  which  assemble 
every  evening  outside  the  stations  to  meet  the  hospital 
trains,  swept  away  forever. 

That  is  the  old  London  —  London  as  we  would  have 
you  see  it  —  London  as  we  hope  you  will  see  it  when 
you  come  back  to  us  as  holiday  visitors.  Meanwhile,  we 
know  you  will  make  allowances  for  us. 


A  WORD  TO  THE  DEDICATEE     xi 

Also,  you  may  not  find  us  very  hilarious.  In  some  ways 
we  are  strangely  cheerful.  For  instance,  you  will  see  httle 
mourning  worn  in  pubUc.  That  is  because,  if  black  were 
worn  by  all  those  who  were  entitled  to  wear  it,  you  would 
see  little  else.  Again,  you  will  find  our  theatres  packed 
night  after  night  by  a  noisy,  cheerful  throng.  But  these 
are  not  idle  people,  nor  are  they  the  same  people  all  the 
time.  They  are  almost  entirely  hard-worked  folks  enjoy- 
ing a  few  days'  vacation.  The  majority  of  them  are  sol- 
diers on  leave  from  the  Front.  Few  of  them  will  be  here 
next  week;  some  of  them  will  never  see  a  play  again. 
The  play  goes  on  and  helps  the  audience  to  forget  for  a 
while,  but  it  is  a  different  audience  every  time. 

And  you  will  hear  little  talk  about  the  War.  We 
prefer  to  talk  of  almost  anything  else.  Probably  you 
will  understand  why.  There  is  hardly  a  house  in  this 
country  which  has  not  by  this  time  made  a  personal 
contribution  to  our  cause.  In  each  of  these  houses 
one  of  two  trials  is  being  endured  —  bereavement,  the 
lesser  evil,  or  suspense,  the  greater.  We  cannot,  there- 
fore, talk  lightly  of  the  War,  and  being  determined  not 
to  talk  anxiously  about  it,  we  compromise  —  we  do  not 
talk  about  it  at  all. 

We  want  you  to  know  this.  To  know  is  to  understand. 

II.  First  Impressions 

Meanwhile,  let  us  ask  for  your  impressions  of  our 
country.  It  is  only  fair  that  we  should  be  allowed  to  do 
this,  for  you  know  what  happens  to  visitors  in  the 
United  States  when  the  reporters  get  their  hooks  into 
them. 

So  far  as  I  have  been  able  to  gather,  your  impressions 
amount  to  something  like  this: 

There  is  no  ice-water,  no  ice-cream,  no  soda-fountains. 


xii    A  WORD  TO  THE  DEDICATEE 

no  pie.  It  is  hard  to  get  the  old  familiar  eats  in  our 
restaurants. 

Our  cities  are  planned  in  such  a  way  that  it  is  impossi- 
ble to  get  to  any  place  without  a  map  and  compass. 

Our  traffic  all  keeps  to  the  wrong  side  of  the  street. 

Our  public  buildings  are  too  low. 

There  are  hardly  any  street-car  lines  in  London. 

Our  raih'oad  cars  are  like  boxes,  and  our  locomotives 
are  the  smallest  things  on  earth. 

Our  weather  is  composed  of  samples. 

Our  coinage  system  is  a  practical  joke. 

Nobody,  whether  in  street,  train  or  tube,  ever  enters 
in  conversation  with  you.  If  by  any  chance  they  do,  they 
grouch  all  the  time  about  the  Government  and  the 
general  management  of  the  country. 

Let  us  take  the  eats  and  drinks  first.  There  is  no  ice- 
water.  I  admit  it.  I  am  sorry,  but  there  it  is.  There  never 
was  much,  but  now  that  ammonia  is  mostly  comman- 
deered for  munition  work,  there  is  less  than  ever.  As  a 
nation  we  do  not  miss  it.  In  this  country  our  difficulty 
is  not  to  get  cool,  but  to  keep  warm.  Besides,  it  is  pos- 
sible that  our  moist  climate,  and  the  absence  of  steam- 
heat  in  our  houses,  saves  us  from  that  parched  feeling 
which  I  have  so  often  experienced  in  the  United  States. 
Anyway,  that  familiar  figure  of  American  domestic  life, 
the  iceman,  is  unknown  to  us.  We  drink  our  water  at 
ordinary  temperature  —  what  you  would  call  tepid  — 
and  we  keep  our  meat  in  a  stone  cellar  instead  of  the 
ice  chest.  As  for  ice-cream  and  soda-fountains,  we  have 
never  given  ourselves  over  to  them  very  much.  As  a 
nation,  we  are  hot-food  eaters  —  that  is,  when  we  can 
get  anything  to  eat!  We  are  living  on  strict  war  rations 
here,  just  as  you  are  beginning  to  do  in  the  States.  So 
you  must  forgive  our  apparent  want  of  hospitality. 


A  WORD  TO  THE  DEDICATEE    xiii 

III.  The  Land  We  live  in 

Next,  our  cities.  After  your  own  straight,  wide, 
methodically-numbered  streets  and  avenues,  London, 
Liverpool,  Glasgow,  and  the  rest  must  seem  like  a 
Chinese  puzzle.  I  can  only  say  in  excuse  that  they  have 
been  there  a  very  long  time,  and  the  people  who  started 
in  to  build  them  did  not  foresee  that  they  would  ever 
extend  more  than  a  few  blocks.  If  Julius  CsBsar  had 
known  that  London  was  ultimately  going  to  cover  an 
area  of  seven  hundred  square  miles,  and  house  a  popula- 
tion of  seven  and  a  half  milhons,  I  dare  say  he  would 
have  made  a  more  methodical  beginning.  But  Julius 
Caesar  never  visited  America,  and  the  science  of  town- 
planning  was  unknown  to  him. 

The  narrow,  winding  streets  of  London  are  not  suited 
to  trolley-car  lines.  This  fact  has  given  us  the  unique 
London  motor  'bus,  driven  with  incredible  skill,  and 
gay  with  advertisements.  There  are  not  so  many  of 
these  'buses  to-day  as  there  might  be,  and  such  as 
there  are  are  desperately  full.  But  —  c'est  la  guerre ! 
Hundreds  of  our  motor  'buses  are  over  in  France 
now.  You  will  meet  them  when  you  get  there,  doing 
their  bit  —  hurrying  reenforcements  to  some  hard- 
pressed  point,  or  running  from  the  back  areas  to  the 
railhead,  conveying  happy,  muddy  Tommies  home  on 
leave. 

And  while  we  are  discussing  London,  let  me  recom- 
mend you  to  make  a  point  of  getting  acquainted  with 
the  London  pohceman.  He  is  a  truly  great  man.  Watch 
him  directing  the  traffic  down  in  the  City,  or  where 
Wellington  Street,  on  its  way  to  Waterloo  Bridge, 
crosses  the  Strand.  He  has  no  semaphore,  no  whistle; 
but  simply  extends  an  arm,  or  turns  his  back,  and  the 
traffic  swings  to  right  or  left,  or  stops  altogether.  For- 


xiv    A  WORD  TO  THE  DEDICATEE 

eign  cities,  even  New  York,  are  not  ashamed  to  send 
their  poHce  to  London  to  pick  up  hints  on  traffic  control 
from  the  London  "Bobby."  Watch  him  handle  an  un- 
ruly crowd.  He  is  unarmed,  and  though  he  carries  a  club, 
you  seldom  see  it.  If  you  get  lost,  ask  him  to  direct  you, 
for  he  carries  a  map  of  London  inside  his  head.  He  is 
everybody's  friend.  By  the  way,  if  he  wears  a  helmet 
he  is  one  of  the  regular  force.  A  flat  cap  is  a  sign  of  a 
"Special"  —  that  is,  a  business  man  who  is  giving  his 
spare  time,  by  day  or  night,  to  take  the  place  of  those 
policemen  who  have  joined  the  Colours.  But,  "Regular" 
or  "  Special,"  he  is  there  to  help  you. 

There  are  no  skyscrapers  in  England.  The  fact  is, 
London  is  no  place  for  skyscrapers.  It  was  New  York 
which  set  the  fashion.  That  was  because  Manhattan 
Island,  with  the  Hudson  on  one  side  and  the  East  River 
on  the  other,  is  physically  incapable  of  expansion,  and 
so  New  York,  being  unable  to  spread  out,  shot  upwards. 
Moreover,  New  York  is  built  on  solid  rock  —  you  ask 
the  Subway  contractors  about  that !  —  while  the  orig- 
inal London  was  built  on  a  marsh,  and  the  marsh  is 
there  still.  So  it  will  not  support  structures  like  the 
Woolworth  Building. 

Most  of  our  national  highways  start  from  London. 
There  is  one,  a  Roman  road,  called  WatUng  Street, 
which  starts  from  the  Marble  Arch  and  runs  almost  as 
straight  as  a  rod  from  London  to  Chester,  nearly  two 
hundred  miles;  and  it  never  changes  its  name  after  the 
first  few  miles,  which  are  called  the  Edgware  Road. 
Another,  the  Great  North  Road,  runs  from  London  to 
Edinburgh,  and  is  four  hundred  miles  long.  One  hundred 
years  ago  the  mail  coaches  thundered  along  that  road 
night  and  day,  and  highwaymen  had  their  own  particu- 
lar pitches  where  no  other  highwaymen  dreamed  of  but- 


A  WORD  TO  THE  DEDICATEE     xv 

ting  in.  Five  years  ago  that  road  was  a  running  river 
of  touring  automobiles.  Now,  strings  of  grey  military 
motor  lorries  rumble  up  and  down  its  entire  length. 
Perhaps  you  will  ride  on  some  of  them. 

London,  easy-going  London,  has  her  short  cuts,  too. 
That  is  where  she  differs  from  the  methodical,  rectangu- 
lar, convenient  cities  of  the  United  States.  She  is  full  of 
cunning  by-ways,  and  every  street  has  a  character  of 
its  own.  The  Strand  was  called  "  The  Strand  "  a  thousand 
years  ago,  because  it  was  a  strand  —  a  strip  of  beach 
which  ran  alongside  the  Thames  at  the  foot  of  a  cliff 
(which  has  long  since  been  smoothed  and  sloped  out  of 
existence)  and  was  submerged  each  high  tide.  The  Eng- 
hsh  fought  a  great  battle  with  Danish  pirates  near  by, 
and  to-day  the  dead  Danes  sleep  their  last  sleep  in  St. 
Clement  Danes'  Church,  right  in  the  middle  of  the 
Strand. 

Charing  Cross,  again,  is  the  last  of  a  great  chain  of 
such  Crosses,  stretching  from  London  to  Scotland,  each 
a  day's  march  from  the  next.  They  were  set  up  at  the 
end  of  the  thirteenth  century  by  King  Edward  the  First 
of  England,  to  commemorate  the  last  journey  of  his 
beloved  Queen  —  his  Chere  Reine  —  who  died  while 
accompanying  him  upon  a  campaign  against  the  Scots. 
At  each  stopping-place  on  his  homeward  journey  the 
King  erected  one  of  these  crosses  to  mark  the  spot  where 
the  Queen's  body  lay  that  night.  Many  have  perished, 
but  you  can  still  trace  some  of  them  along  the  Great 
North  Road  —  Neville's  Cross,  Waltham  Cross,  and 
finally  Chere  Reine  Cross,  or  Charing  Cross.  That 
strikes  the  imagination.  So  do  Aldgate,  Aldersgate, 
Moorgate,  London  Wall,  and  other  streets  which  go 
back  to  the  days  when  London  really  was  a  walled  city. 

But  a  walk  around  London  repays  itself.  There  is 


xvi    A  WORD  TO  THE  DEDICATEE 

Cleopatra's  Needle  on  the  Embankment  —  the  veteran 
among  all  monuments  of  the  world,  except  perhaps 
its  sister  in  Central  Park,  New  York.  It  was  in  existence 
fifteen  hmidred  years  before  Christ,  in  the  city  of  Helio- 
polis.  It  looked  down  upon  the  Palace  and  Court  of 
Queen  Cleopatra  in  Alexandria.  After  that  it  lay  pros- 
trate in  the  sands  of  the  Egyptian  desert  for  another 
fifteen  hundred  years.  It  was  finally  presented  to  the 
British  Government  by  the  Khedive  of  Egypt.  It  was 
towed  to  England  on  a  raft,  and  was  nearly  lost  during 
a  storm  in  the  Bay  of  Biscay.  Recently,  the  Zeppelins 
have  tried  dropping  bombs  on  it,  as  you  can  see  for 
yourself.  But  a  mere  bomb  or  two  is  nothing  to  a  vete- 
ran with  a  constitution  like  that. 

In  Warwickshire,  around  Stratford  and  the  Forest  of 
Arden,  you  will  find  yourself  in  Shakespeare's  country. 
At  Gerrard's  Cross  William  Penn  is  buried.  In  the  old 
days  a  watch  was  kept  on  the  grave,  as  certain  patriotic 
Americans  considered  that  the  proper  place  for  William 
Penn  to  be  buried  was  Pennsylvania,  and  tried  to  give 
practical  effect  to  this  pious  opinion. 

Scotland,  if  you  happen  to  find  yourself  there,  is  en- 
tirely different  from  England.  England  is  fiat  or  undu- 
lating, and  except  in  the  manufacturing  districts,  is 
given  up  mainly  to  cornfields  and  pasture  land.  Scotland, 
especially  in  the  north,  is  cut  up  into  hills  and  glens. 
Not  such  hills  as  you  possess  in  Colorado,  or  Nevada, 
or  the  Northwest.  There  is  no  Pike's  Peak,  no  Shasta, 
no  Rainier.  The  highest  mountain  in  the  British  Isles  — • 
Ben  Nevis  —  is  only  a  little  over  four  thousand  feet 
high,  but  naturally  Scotsmen  think  a  good  deal  of  it, 

Scotland  is  a  great  battle-ground.  The  Scot  has  always 
been  fighting  some  one.  There  was  perpetual  warfare 
upon  the  border  from  the  earUest  days.  The  Romans, 


A  ^YORD  TO  THE  DEDICATEE    xvii 

who  were  business  men,  built  a  w^all  right  across  England 
from  Newcastle  to  Carlisle,  to  keep  the  Scots  out.  They 
failed,  as  you  will  find  out  for  yourself,  when  you  study 
a  list  of  British  Cabinet  Ministers ;  but  you  can  see  parts 
of  the  wall  still.  Later,  there  were  everlasting  border 
raids,  from  one  side  or  the  other,  maintained  as  a  tradi- 
tion by  the  great  families  of  that  region  —  the  Percys, 
the  Douglases,  the  Maxwells,  the  ElKotts.  Besides  this, 
various  English  kings  tried  to  conquer  Scotland.  Some- 
times one  side  would  win  a  battle,  sometimes  the  other, 
but  no  victory  was  lasting.  At  last,  in  1707,  the  Act  of 
Union  was  passed,  and  Scotland  and  England  came 
under  one  central  Government.  Unfortunately,  the 
Highlanders  of  the  north  were  not  consulted  in  the 
arrangement,  and  they  put  up  two  rebelhons  of  their 
own.  Prince  Charles  Edward,  the  last  of  the  Stuarts, 
actually  invaded  England,  and  got  as  far  as  Derby.  He 
was  defeated,  but  the  rebellion  smouldered  on  for  years 
among  the  Highland  glens.  The  chain  of  forts  along  the 
Caledonian  Canal  to-day  —  Fort  George,  Fort  Augus- 
tus, Fort  WilHam,  now  peaceful  holiday  resorts  —  is  a 
reminder  of  that  time.  But  those  days  are  all  over  now, 
and  for  nearly  two  centuries  English  and  Scottish  sol- 
diers have  fought  side  by  side  all  over  the  world.  Ireland 
was  united  to  England  and  Scotland  by  a  similar  Act  of 
Union  in  1800.  This  event,  as  you  may  possibly  have 
heard,  has  provided  a  fruitful  topic  of  conversation  ever 
since. 

IV.  Our  Climate 

Then  there  is  our  weather.  An  Englishman  never 
knows  on  going  to  work  in  the  morning  whether  to  take 
a  palm-leaf  hat,  or  a  fur  overcoat,  or  a  diving-suit.  The 
trouble  is  that  our  weather  arrives  too  suddenly.  We 


xviii    A  WORD  TO  THE  DEDICATEE 

are  an  island  in  the  middle  of  the  ocean,  and  most  of 
our  weather  comes  in  from  the  Atlantic,  where  there  is 
no  one  to  watch  it.  Our  weather  prophets  simply  have 
to  take  a  chance.  That  is  all.  With  you  it  is  different. 
Your  weather  travels  across  a  continent  three  thousand 
miles  wide.  You  can  see  it  coming,  and  telegraph  to  the 
next  State  what  to  expect. 

So,  if  j^ou  are  spending  a  day's  leave  in  London,  and 
walk  out  of  blazing  sunshine  at  one  end  of  the  street 
into  a  thunderstorm  at  the  other  —  well,  have  a  heart, 
and  put  it  down  to  the  War.  We  will  try  to  fix  things  for 
you  when  peace  comes.  But  we  cannot  promise.  Anyway, 
in  peace-time  we  can  always  wear  rubbers. 

That  is  all  about  British  weather. 

V.  Our  Transportation 

Then  there  are  our  railroads.  These,  like  our  boxed-in 
passenger  coaches  and  little  four-wheel  freight  cars, 
tickle  you  to  death,  I  know.  The  compartment  system  is 
a  national  symptom.  An  Englishman  loves  one  thing 
above  all  others,  and  that  is  to  get  a  railway  compart- 
ment to  himself.  Nobody  knows  why,  but  he  does. 
Probably  the  craving  arises  from  his  inability  to  con- 
verse easily  with  strangers.  That  inability  is  passing 
away.  I  shall  speak  of  it  later.  But  the  three-class  sys- 
tem is  a  reHc  of  antiquity.  Fifty  years  ago  there  were 
three  grades  of  comfort  in  British  railroad  travelling. 
You  could  have  your  family  horse-coach  lashed  upon  an 
open  railroad  truck  and  attached  to  the  train.  You  thus 
travelled  in  your  own  carriage,  or  chaise.  I  do  not  know 
what  happened  to  the  horses.  This  was  the  usual  custom 
of  the  grand  folk  of  those  days.  Or  you  could  travel  by 
ordinary  railway  coaches,  without  cushions  or  windows. 
Or  you  could  pack  yourseK  into  an  open  freight  truck. 


A  WORD  TO  THE  DEDICATEE    xix 

much  as  soldiers  on  the  Western  Front  are  packed  to- 
day, and  so  reach  your  destination  with  other  mer- 
chandise. 

That  has  all  gone  now.  Practically  the  only  differ- 
ence between  first,  second,  and  third  class  in  these  days 
is  a  difference  of  price  —  which  means  elbow-room. 
(Second  class,  by  the  way,  has  almost  entirely  died  out.) 
The  three  classes  are  almost  equal  in  comfort,  especially 
just  now,  when  the  War  has  abolished  nearly  all  dining- 
cars  and  sleepers.  Our  sleeping-car  system  never 
amounted  to  much,  anyivay.  The  journeys  were  too 
short  to  make  it  necessary  for  such  as  were  travelling 
by  night  (and  they  were  comparatively  few)  to  go  to 
bed.  The  lordly  Pullman  car  is  almost  unknown  here. 

I  said  just  now  that  we  used  to  be  proud  of  our  rail- 
roads in  time  of  peace.  We  are  doubly  proud  of  them 
to-day  in  the  stress  of  War.  They  passed  automatically 
into  Government  hands  the  day  the  War  broke  out,  and 
they  have  given  our  whole  country  a  lesson  in  the  art  of 
carrying  on.  Thousands  of  their  employees  are  away  in 
the  trenches;  hundreds  of  their  locomotives  and  freight 
cars  are  in  France  or  Mesopotamia  or  Palestine,  enUsted 
for  the  duration.  You  will  notice  them  when  you  get 
over,  marked  R.O.D.  (Railway  Operating  Department). 
They  have  all  come  from  England.  Miles  of  tracks  here 
have  been  torn  up  and  conveyed  bodily  overseas.  There 
is  little  labour  available  to  execute  repairs,  and  none  to 
build  new  stock.  There  is  a  shortage  of  coal,  a  shortage 
of  oil,  and  no  paint.  Passenger  services  have  been  cut 
down  by  a  half,  and  fares  raised  fifty  per  cent;  yet  the 
traflac  is  still  enormous,  and  the  strain  on  the  depleted 
staffs  is  immense.  But  they  manage  somehow.  Men  who 
have  long  earned  their  retirement  remain  in  service, 
while  boys  and  women  do  the  rest.  Carry  on! 


XX    A  WORD  TO  THE  DEDICATEE 

VI.  Our  Gopher  Runs 

Then  comes  our  substitute  for  your  Subway,  and 
street-car  system  generally.  In  London  you  will  notice 
that  there  are  two  kinds  of  Subway  —  the  so-called 
Underground,  or  shallow  transit,  and  the  deep  Tubes. 
The  system  is  so  complicated,  owing  to  the  shape  of 
London,  that  it  has  been  found  impossible  to  have  a 
one-price  ticket  such  as  prevails  everywhere  in  the 
United  States. 

The  Underground  is  the  oldest  underground  railroad 
in  the  world.  You  probably  gathered  that  for  yourself 
the  first  time  you  saw  it.  Twenty-five  years  ago  its 
trains  were  drawn  by  ordinary  steam  locomotives, 
which  were  supposed  to  consume  their  own  smoke.  Per- 
haps they  did,  but  it  must  have  leaked  out  again  some- 
where. 

The  old  Underground  Railway  of  London  got  nearer 
to  the  ordinary  conception  of  hell  than  anything  yet 
invented.  Stations  and  trains  were  lit  by  feeble  gas 
or  oil  lamps;  all  glass  was  covered  over  with  a  film  of 
soot,  and  the  brightest  illumination  was  provided  by 
the  glow  of  the  locomotive  furnaces  as  the  train  rumbled 
asthmatically  into  a  station.  The  atmosphere  was  a 
mixture  of  soot,  smoke,  sulphur,  and  poison  gas.  The 
trains  were  on  the  box-compartment  system,  and  small 
compartments  at  that.  The  train  usually  waited  two  or 
three  minutes  in  each  station  (instead  of  ten  seconds  as 
now),  and  it  required  a  full  hour  to  travel  from  King's 
Cross  to  Charing  Cross.  It  was  impossible  to  see  to  read 
a  newspaper,  so  that  passengers,  to  pass  the  time,  used 
to  rob,  assault,  and  occasionally  murder  one  another. 
With  the  coming  of  electric  traction  the  old  Under- 
ground was  cleaned  up  and  refurnished.  At  the  same 
time,  the  Tubes  were  constructed  away  down  in  the 


A  WORD  TO  THE  DEDICATEE    xxi 

London  clay,  where  there  could  be  no  interference  from 
oozy  gravel,  or  gas  mains,  or  sewers. 

The  chief  trouble  about  the  Tubes  is  that  no  one 
knows  where  they  are.  Of  course,  every  one  knows  where 
the  stations  are.  For  instance,  every  Londoner  knows 
where  Piccadilly  Circus  Station  is — the  surface  station. 
But  where  is  the  actual  subterranean  station?  Or  rather, 
where  are  the  two  stations,  because  at  this  point  two 
roads  cross,  and  each  has  its  own  subterranean  station. 
Ah!  They  certainly  are  not  where  simple  folk,  like  you 
and  me,  would  expect  them  to  be  —  under  Piccadilly 
Circus.  If  they  were,  you  would  find  them  at  the  foot 
of  the  elevator.  But  that  would  be  too  easy.  It  would 
make  Londoners  fat  and  lazy,  leading  the  sedentary  Ufe 
they  do,  to  step  straight  into  the  train.  So  they  have  to 
walk  about  a  mile.  Where  to,  no  one  knows.  But  there 
is  a  school  of  philosophers  which  believes  that  a  good 
many  of  the  Tube  stations  have  no  subterranean  sta- 
tions at  all.  One  subterranean  is  shared  jointly  by  sev- 
eral surface  stations.  A  short  circular  train  ride  is  pro- 
vided, just  to  furnish  the  necessary  illusion,  and  the 
passenger,  having  really  walked  to  his  destination,  steps 
out  of  the  train  well  satisfied,  and  goes  up  the  right 
elevator  under  the  impression  that  he  has  been  carried 
there.  That  is  our  Tube  system  as  far  as  modern  research 
has  been  able  to  fathom  it.  Of  course,  an  Englishman 
could  never  have  thought  out  such  a  good  practical  joke 
as  these  Tubes.  The  entire  system  was  projected  and 
constructed  by  an  American. 

VII.  Our  National  Joke 

But  we  have  a  sense  of  humour  all  the  same.  Our 
money  system,  like  our  joint  system  of  weights  and 
measures,  is,  as  you  very  properly  observe,  a  practical 


xxii    A  WORD  TO  THE  DEDICATEE 

joke.  It  dates  back  to  the  time  when  an  EngHshman 
bought  his  Sunday  dinner  with  a  pound  of  rock.  It  is 
bound  to  go  soon,  and  make  way  for  the  decimal  sj's- 
tem,  just  as  inches  and  feet  and  yards  are  ah^ead}^  mak- 
ing way  in  this  country  for  metres  and  centimetres. 
Meanwhile  we  have  got  to  put  up  with  it. 

The  main  points  for  an  American  to  remember  are  — 
firstly,  that  a  shilling  over  here,  despite  war  scarcity, 
will  still  buy  rather  more  than  a  quarter  will  buy  in 
New  York;  and  secondly,  the  necessity  of  keeping 
clearly  in  mind  the  difference  between  a  half-crown  and 
a  two-shilling  piece.  Even  taxi-drivers  do  not  always 
know  the  difference.  If  you  give  them  half  a  crown 
they  will  frequently  hand  you  change  for  a  two-shilling 
piece. 

VIII.  Ourselves 

Lastly,  ourselves.  This  chapter  is  going  to  be  the  most 
difficult. 

Last  year  I  met  an  American  soldier  in  London.  He 
was  one  of  the  first  who  had  come  over.  I  asked  his 
impressions.  He  said: 

"I  have  been  in  London  three  days,  and  not  a  soul 
has  spoken  to  me." 

And  therein  was  summed  up  the  fundamental  differ- 
ence between  our  two  nations.  In  the  United  States 
people  like  to  see  one  another  and  talk  to  one  another, 
and  meet  fresh  people.  If  a  stranger  comes  to  town, 
reporters  interview  him  as  he  steps  off  the  train.  Amer- 
icans prefer  when  travelling  to  do  so  in  open  cars.  At 
home  their  living-room  doors  are  usually  left  open. 
Every  room  stands  open  to  every  other.  In  their  clubs 
and  hotels  there  are  few  private  rooms.  In  their  business 
houses  the  head  of  the  fii'm,  the  staff,  and  the  clerks, 


A  WORD  TO  THE  DEDICATEE    xxiii 

frequently  work  together  in  one  great  hall.  If  any  parti- 
tions exist  they  are  only  table-high  or  they  are  made  of 
glass.  Plenty  of  light,  plenty  of  air,  plenty  of  pubhcity. 
That  is  America. 

Now  over  here,  somehow,  we  are  different.  I  said  be- 
fore that  an  Englishman's  ambition  in  life  was  to  get  a 
compartment  to  himself.  That  principle,  for  good  or  ill 
prevails  through  all  our  habits.  On  the  railroad  we 
travel  in  separate  boxes.  At  home  all  our  rooms  have 
doors,  and  we  keep  them  shut.  (This  by  the  way,  is 
chiefly  in  order  to  get  warm,  for  there  is  no  central 
heating.)  In  most  of  our  clubs  there  are  rooms  where  no 
one  is  allowed  to  speak.  They  are  crowded  with  English- 
men. Only  a  few  years  ago  one  never  thought  of  dining 
in  a  restaurant  except  when  travelling.  If  he  did,  he 
always  asked  for  a  private  room.  If  you  dine  at  Simp- 
son's in  the  Strand  to-day  you  will  still  see  a  relic  of  the 
custom  in  the  curious  boxed-in  compartments  which 
enclose  some  of  the  tables.  In  our  business  houses  the 
head  of  the  department  is  concealed  in  one  hutch,  the 
partners  in  another.  The  chief  clerk  has  one  too.  The 
other  clerks  may  have  to  work  in  one  room;  but  each 
clerk  cherishes  just  one  ambition,  and  that  is  to  rise 
high  enough  in  the  business  to  secure  honourable  con- 
finement in  a  hutch  of  his  own. 

For  the  same  reason  every  Englishman  keeps  a  fence 
round  his  garden  —  be  it  castle  or  cottage  garden  — 
just  to  show  that  it  is  his  garden  and  no  one  else's.  And 
if  you  look  into  any  old  English  parish  church  you  will 
see  the  same  thing.  Every  family  has  its  own  pew;  the 
humblest  pew  has  a  door,  and  when  the  family  gets 
inside  the  pew  it  shuts  the  door.  Some  of  the  pews  have 
curtains  around  them  as  well.  The  occupant  can  see  the 
minister,  and  the  minister  can  see  him.  The  rest  of  the 


xxiv    A  WORD  TO  THE  DEDICATEE 

congi'egation  are  as  invisible  to  him  as  he  is  to  them. 
No  one  in  the  congregation  resents  this  at  all.  They  are 
rather  proud  of  the  custom.  It  represents  to  them  only 
what  is  right  and  proper,  the  principle  of  a  compartment 
to  one's  self. 

And  so  a  nation  which  has  lived  for  centuries  upon 
this  plan  is  not  a  nation  which  enters  readily  or  easily 
into  conversation  outside  its  own  particular  compart- 
ment. But  how  was  I  to  explain  or  excuse  such  a  state 
of  mind  to  my  American  soldier  friend?  Let  me  say 
right  here  that  this  constrained  behaviour  does  not  arise 
from  churlishness,  or  want  of  good-will.  Even  the  Ger- 
mans admit  that.  A  German  philosopher  once  said,  with 
considerable  truth  for  a  German:  "The  Englishman  is  a 
cold  friend,  but  a  good  neighbour.  He  may  shut  himself 
up  with  his  property,  but  he  will  never  dream  of  invad- 
ing yours."  This  statement  is  only  partially  correct. 
The  Englishman  is  one  of  the  warmest-hearted  and  most 
hospitable  of  men.  But  he  is  a  bad  starter  —  a  bad 
starter  in  War,  Love,  Business,  and,  above  all.  Conver- 
sation. Once  get  him  started,  and  he  refuses  to  leave  off. 
But  you  must  start  him  first.  And  you  are  doing  it. 

The  Englishman's  passion  for  his  own  compartment 
goes  back  a  very,  very  long  way,  right  into  the  centuries. 
It  goes  back  to  the  days  when  we  lived  in  tribes  and 
every  tribe  kept  to  itself,  and  an  Englishman's  house 
was  his  castle  —  especially  if  the  house  were  a  one-room 
mud  hut.  That  makes  us  what  we  are  to  this  day.  Also 
we  are  cooped  up  in  a  small  island,  and  most  of  us  have 
never  left  it.  No  Englishman  ever  speaks  to  another 
Englishman  if  he  can  help  it.  This  is  partly  the  old  tribal 
instinct,  partly  laziness,  and  partly  fear  of  a  rebuff. 
Also,  it  may  involve  explanations,  and  an  Englishman 
would  rather  be  scalped  than  explain.  So  he  saves  trouble 


A  WORD  TO  THE  DEDICATEE    xxv 

all  round  by  burying  himself  in  a  newspaper  and  saying 
nothing. 

That  by  the  way.  But  the  main  object  of  this  little 
book  is  to  make  you  welcome  to  England,  whoever  you 
may  be,  and  to  show  you  why  it  is  that  in  our  inarticu- 
late and  undemonstrative  English  way,  we  love  our 
small  country  just  as  you  love  your  big  continent. 

"This  fortress  built  by  Nature  by  herself 
Against  infection  and  the  hand  of  war; 
This  happy  breed  of  men,  this  little  world; 
This  precious  stone  set  in  a  silver  sea; 
This  blessed  plot,  this  earth,  this  realm,  this  England." 

That  is  how  William  Shakespeare  felt  about  this  "right 
little  tight  little  island"  three  hundred  years  ago,  in 
days  when  our  nation  was  fighting  for  its  Hfe,  neither 
for  the  first  nor  for  the  last  time,  against  overwhelm- 
ingly superior  forces.  And  we  hope  that  when  you  go 
back  safe  and  victorious,  as  we  pray  God  you  may,  to 
your  own  beautiful  land,  you  will  carry  with  you  a  little 
of  that  same  feehng,  and  a  real  understanding  of  the 
passionate  sentiment  that  lies  beneath  it. 

So  we  bid  you  welcome.  And  we  ask  you,  our  honoured 
guests,  to  do  all  you  can  to  get  into  close  touch  with 
the  habits  and  point  of  view  of  our  country,  both  here 
and  upon  that  battle-front  whither  you  are  bound,  to 
play  your  own  splendid  part  in  the  Great  Game. 

We  are  never  going  back  to  the  old  days  when  Eng- 
lishmen, Scotsmen,  Irishmen,  Canadians,  Australians, 
and  Americans  sat  each  in  their  own  compartment,  and 
thanked  God  that  they  had  it  to  themselves.  We  English- 
speaking  races  have  got  together  over  this  War.  We  have 
lost  terribly,  but  we  are  gaining  much.  We  are  rubbing 
shoulders  in  London,  and  Paris,  and  countless  other 


xxvi    A  WORD  TO  THE  DEDICATEE 

places,  and  we  are  rubbing  the  knobs  and  the  angles  off 
one  another,  good  and  plenty.  It  is  not  always  easy  or 
comfortable  to  have  knobs  rubbed  off  you,  and  the 
process  sometimes  involves  a  little  friction;  but  we  must 
be  prepared  for  that. 

For  instance,  we  all  speak  English,  but  we  all  pro- 
nounce it  in  different  ways.  Well,  why  not?  Hitherto  we 
have  been  inchned  to  assume  that  the  other  man  was 
talking  hke  that  to  annoy  us.  That  is  one  of  the  knobs 
that  has  to  be  rubbed  off  —  intolerance  of  trivial 
matters  of  taste  and  habit.  To-day,  under  the  most 
searching  test  in  the  world  —  the  test  of  comradeship 
in  the  face  of  battle  and  sudden  death  —  we  are  acquir- 
ing a  profound  respect  for  one  another.  AVhen  we  have 
acquired  just  one  other  thing  —  tolerance  for  one  an- 
other's point  of  view  —  we  shall  have  laid  the  founda- 
tion of  an  understanding  which  is  going  to  hold  us  all 
up  through  some  difficult  times  hereafter.  Getting  this 
old  world  back  on  to  a  peace  basis,  after  the  Kaiser  has 
been  put  where  he  belongs,  is  going  to  call  for  all  our 
courage,  sincerity,  and  loyalty  to  our  common  ideals. 
When  that  period  of  Reconstruction  comes  —  and  it 
may  come  sooner  than  we  think  —  the  first  plank  in  its 
platform  must  be  a  solid  understanding  between  the  two 
English-speaking  races.  They,  at  least,  must  speak  with 
one  voice,  or  the  whole  fabric  will  fall  to  the  ground. 

Our  two  nations  can  never  hope  entirely  to  under- 
stand one  another.  Neither  can  they  expect  always  to 
see  eye  to  eye.  Their  national  personalities  are  too 
robust.  But  to-day  their  sons  are  learning  to  know  the 
worst  of  one  another  and  the  best  of  one  another  and 
the  invincible  humanity  of  one  another.  With  that 
knowledge  will  come  —  if  we  have  the  will  —  tolerance 
of  one  another's  point  of  view.  We  must  get  that.  There 


A  WORD  TO  THE  DEDICATEE    xxvii 

are  thousands  of  reasons  why,  but  to  you,  soldiers  and 
sailors,  I  am  only  going  to  mention  one. 

When  the  Victory  comes,  we  shall  enjoy  its  rewards. 
But  all  the  while  we  shall  be  conscious  that  we  have 
not  won  these  entirely  by  ourselves.  We  shall  in  great 
measure  have  inherited  them  from  men  who  have  not 
lived  to  enjoy  the  fruits  of  their  own  sacrifice  —  men 
whom  we  have  left  behind,  in  France,  Belgium,  and 
Italy;  in  Asia  and  Africa;  whose  bones  cover  the  ocean 
floor  —  men  who  gave  everything  that  the  Cause  might 
Hve.  To  these  we  shall  desire  to  raise  a  lasting  memorial. 
We  can  best  do  that  by  building  up  a  fabric  of  under- 
standing on  the  foundation  which  they  laid,  so  truly, 
with  their  own  lives.  If  we  do  that  —  and  only  if  we  do 
that  —  our  Dead  can  sleep  in  peace;  for  they  will  know 
that  what  they  died  for  was  worth  while,  and  above  all 
that  we,  their  heritors,  have  kept  faith  with  them  — 

"...  Famous  men 
From  whose  bays  we  borrow  — 
They  that  put  aside  To-day, 
All  the  joys  of  their  To-day, 
And  with  toil  of  their  To-day 
Bought  for  us  To-morrow." 

Ian  Hay 

London,  July,  1918 


The  Last  Million 

CHAPTER  ONE 

THE  ARGONAUTS 

A  SHIP  is  sailing  on  the  sea  —  a  tall  ship,  vnth  sev- 
eral masts  and  an  imposing  array  of  smokestacks. 
She  is  mo\dng  at  a  strictly  processional  pace,  with 
a  certain  air  of  professional  boredom.  In  fact,  the 
disconsolate  hissing  of  her  steam  escape-pipes  in- 
timates quite  plainly  that  she  is  accustomed  to 
a  hvelier  Ufe  than  this.  But  a  convoy  belongs  to 
the  straitest  sect  of  Labour-Unionism:  its  pace 
is  regulated  to  that  of  the  slowest  performer;  so 
ocean  greyhounds  in  such  company  must  restrain 
themselves  as  best  they  may. 

All  around  her  steam  other  ships.  They  are 
striped,  spotted,  and  ringstraked  as  to  their  hulls, 
smokestacks,  and  spars  in  a  manner  highly  gratify- 
ing to  that  school  of  unappreciated  geniuses,  the 
Futurists,  —  or  Cubists,  or  Vorticists,  or  whatever 
the  malady  is  called,  —  but  exasperating  to  the 
submerged  Hun,  endeavouring  to  calculate  knot- 
tage  and  obtain  ranging-points  through  a  per- 
plexed periscope.  On  the  outer  fringe  of  the  flotilla 
fuss  the  sheep-dogs  —  the  escorting  warships. 

If  you  seek  to  ascertain  the  nationality  of  our 
tall  ship,  by  internal  evidence,  you  will  probably 
begin  by  observing  certain  notices  painted  up 


2  THE  LAST  MILLION 

about  the  decks  and  cabins,  requesting  you  to  keep 
off  the  bridge,  or  to  refrain  from  throwing  cigar- 
ends  on  the  deck,  or  not  to  leave  this  tap  running. 
You  will  next  observe  that  these  notices  are  in- 
scribed in  Enghsh,  French,  and  another  language. 
What  language,  it  is  impossible  to  say,  for  some 
one  has  pasted  a  strip  of  blank  paper  over  the  in- 
scription in  every  case.  But  it  is  easy  to  guess.  In 
the  depths,  here  and  there,  German  is  still  spoken; 
but  upon  the  face  of  the  broad  ocean  it  is  a  dead 
language. 

Talking  of  nationalities,  you  will  further  observe 
that  these  ships  all  fly  the  Union  Jack.  But  they 
are  crowded  with  American  soldiers.  There  must 
be  thousands  of  these  soldiers.  They  swarm  every- 
where —  bunched  on  deck,  peering  through  port- 
holes, or  plastering  the  rigging  hke  an  overflow  of 
mustard  sauce,  which  in  truth  they  are.  They  are 
more  than  that.  They  are  a  portent.  They  are  a 
symbol.  They  are  a  testimonial  —  to  the  Kaiser; 
for  has  not  that  indefatigable  bungler  by  his  own 
efforts  brought  about  a  long-overdue  understand- 
ing between  all  the  English-speaking  people  in  the 
world? 

Above  all,  they  are  a  direct  answer  to  a  particu- 
lar challenge. 

A  few  weeks  ago  the  Men  at  the  Top  in  Ger- 
many got  together  and  held  what  is  known  in  mih- 
tary  circles  as  a  pow-wow.  A  condensed  report  of 
their  deliberations  would  have  read  something  hke 
this: 

"Yes,  Majesty,  the  Good  Old  German  God  is  un- 


THE  ARGONAUTS  3 

doubtedly  on  the  side  of  our  Army.  Still,  the  fact 
remains  that  we  have  not  yet  achieved  anything, 
after  three-and-a-half  years  of  war,  really  worth 
while.  .  .  .  Belgium,  Serbia,  Roumania,  Russia? 
Yes,  no  doubt.  Each  of  those  countries  has  now 
received  the  true  reward  of  her  stupidity  and  pre- 
sumption; but  none  of  them  ever  offered  any  seri- 
ous difficulty  from  a  military  point  of  view,  except 
Russia ;  and  the  credit  for  her  collapse  was  due  far 
more  to  our  internal  agents  than  to  our  external 
military  pressure.  .  .  .  No,  Hindenburg,  I  have  n't 
forgotten  Tannenberg;  but  you  have  n't  done 
very  much  since  then  (except  get  gold  nails 
knocked  into  yourself) ,  and  what  you  have  accom- 
plished has  been  chiefly  under  —  ahem!  —  my  di- 
rection. .  .  .  No,  no,  I  am  not  really  pinning  orchids 
on  myself  —  not  yet,  anyway.  I  am  merely  trying 
to  be  candid  and  frank:  in  short,  I  am  reminding 
you  that  you  are  only  a  figurehead.  You  know  what 
irreverent  people  call  you  —  '  General  What-do- 
you-Say ! ' 

" .  .  .  Yes,  Your  Imperial  Highness,  your  con- 
summate generalship  at  Verdun  undoubtedly 
achieved  an  historic  victory  over  the  French;  but 
you  will  forgive  me  for  pointing  out  that  your  cas- 
ualties were  at  least  twice  as  numerous  as  theirs, 
and  that  the  ground  which  you  captured  has  since 
been  regained.  .  .  .  Submarines  ?  My  good  Von 
Capelle,  your  submarines  are  as  obsolete  as  our 
late  lamented  friend  Von  Tirpitz.  Justify  my  state- 
ment? In  a  moment.  . .  .  Yes,  Majesty,  the  British 
Army  failed  utterly  to  break   our  Une  at  the 


4  THE  LAST  MILLION 

Somme,  but  they  and  the  French  took  seventy 
thousand  of  our  best  troops  prisoner,  and  we  had 
to  execute  a  'strategic'  retirement  which  lost  us 
about  a  thousand  square  miles  of  French  soil.  Not 
much  of  a  performance  for  the  German  Army  — 
the  German  Army  —  to  put  up  against  a  mob  of 
half -trained  mercenaries!  We  managed  to  delude 
our  people  into  the  belief  that  we  had  scored  a 
great  military  triumph  in  so  doing,  but  the  Ger- 
man nation,  excellent  though  their  disciphne  is, 
are  not  hkely  to  go  on  swallowing  that  stuff  forever. 
You  know  that,  better  than  most,  Hertling!  Beth- 
mann-Hollweg  knew  it  too:  he  was  no  match  for 
Liebknecht,  although  he  did  lock  him  up.  .  .  . 

''And  what  of  the  situation  since  the  Somme? 
Haig  is  within  ten  miles  of  Ostend,  and  has  cap- 
tured practically  the  whole  of  the  Paschendaele 
Ridge.  .  .  .  The  Eastern  Front  ?  Nothing  matters 
in  this  war  except  the  Western  Front.  What  are  we 
going  to  do  about  that?  .  .  .  Your  Majesty  will  as- 
sume supreme  command?  Splendid!  .  .  .  And  break 
the  Western  Front  f  Colossal!  That  was  just  what  I 
was  about  to  suggest.  Now  for  the  plan  of  cam- 
paign, which  I  do  not  doubt  Your  Majesty  has 
already  sketched  out.  .  .  .  Perhaps  Your  Majesty 
will  permit  Hindenburg  and  myself  to  remain  here 
a  few  moments  longer,  while  you  unfold  it?  We 
need  not  detain  His  Imperial  Highness  the  Crown 
Prince.  He  is  the  man  of  Action:  his  task  will  come 
later.  {For  Heaven's  sake,  Von  Hertling,  get  him 
out  of  here,  or  our  two  military  geniuses  will  be 
at  loggerheads  in  five  minutes!)    "...  And  now. 


THE  ARGONAUTS  5 

Majesty,  you  suggest  —  ?  .  .  .  That  is  a  superb 
plan;  but  it  appears  to  me  —  I  mean,  to  Hinden- 
burg  —  that  you  —  we  —  are  rating  one  of  the 
nations  opposed  to  us  too  lightly.  .  .  .  Yes,  Your 
Majesty,  I  know  you  are  going  to  stand  no  non- 
sense from  them  after  the  War,  —  in  fact,  you 
warned  their  Ambassador,  most  properly,  if  I  may 
say  so,  to  that  effect,  —  but  would  it  not  be  a  good 
move,  just  as  a  preHminary,  to  stand  no  nonsense 
from  them  during  the  War  ?  .  .  .  Too  far  away  ? 
They  can't  get  over  f  Well  —  here  are  the  approxi- 
mate numbers  of  the  American  troops  already  in 
France.  And  there  are  a  lot  of  them  in  England  too. 
.  .  .  Rather  surprising  f  Yes.  Indeed,  quite  a  credit- 
able feat  for  an  un warlike  nation.  I  shall  show  these 
figiu'es  to  Von  Capelle:  it  will  justify  what  I  said 
about  his  submarines :  in  fact,  it  will  annoy  him  ex- 
tremely. And  there  are  more  coming.  They  are 
pouring  over  faster  and  faster.  I  shall  tell  him  that 
too.  .  .  .  But  the  Americans  have  had  no  experience 
of  intensive  warfare  f  And  they  have  fallen  behind 
with  their  constructive  programme  —  aeroplanes  and 
artillery?  Quite  so.  And,  therefore,  taking  these 
facts  into  consideration,  I  —  Hindenburg  —  Your 
Majesty  will  doubtless  decide  that  om*  only  chance 
is  to  concentrate  in  overwhelming  strength,  here 
and  now,  against  one  of  the  two  enemy  forces  at 
present  opposed  to  us,  and  destroy  that  force  in  de- 
tail before  the  Americans  can  throw  any  considera- 
ble body  of  troops  into  the  line.  .  .  .  Expensive  ? 
Undoubtedly.  .  .  .  No  one  has  ever  succeeded  during 
this  War  in  breaking  a  properly  organized  trench- 


6  THE  LAST  MILLION 

line  ?  Agreed ;  but  only  because  no  one  has  yet  been 
able  or  willing  to  pay  the  necessary  price.  The 
British  might  have  done  it  on  the  Somme,  but 
Haig  was  too  squeamish  about  the  lives  of  his  men. 
British  generals  are  handicapped  in  their  military 
dispositions  by  a  pubhc  opinion  which  happily 
does  not  exist  in  our  enUghtened  Fatherland.  I  — 
Hin  —  Your  Majesty  can  afford  to  do  it.  With  all 
these  unemployed  Divisions  from  the  Russian 
Front,  we  can  go  to  the  limit  in  the  matter  of  casu- 
alties. .  .  .  How  many  ?  Well,  I  think  we  can  afford 
to  lose  a  million  men  —  say  a  million  .  .  .  Yes, 
indeed,  Majesty,  your  heart  must  bleed  at  the 
prospect;  but  after  all,  it  is  for  the  ultimate  good 
of  Humanity.  .  .  .  '  One  cannot  make  omelettes  with- 
out breaking  eggsf  Admirable!  Your  Majesty's 
fehcity  of  phrase  shows  no  falUng  off,  I  perceive. 
And  yet  the  Americans  talk  of  their  Woodrow  Wil- 
son! Besides,  it  will  be  a  million  less  to  make  trou- 
ble for  Us  after  the  War.  Now,  I  suppose  we  are  all 
agreed  on  the  foe  to  be  crushed?  .  .  .  The  British  f 
Naturally.  The  British !  The  time  has  come  to  drive 
them  into  the  sea.  Haig  has  recently  extended  his 
line  twenty-eight  miles  —  rather  reluctantly,  too. 
He  has  had  to  send  troops  to  Italy,  and  he  had 
heavy  casualties  in  Belgium  last  autumn.  Twenty- 
seven  thousand  killed,  in  fact.  Still,  without  a 
supreme  conmaander,  you  cannot  blame  the  vari- 
ous Allied  leaders  for  '  passing  the  buck '  to  one 
another,  as  the  Yankees  say.  We  can  accumulate 
troops  on  his  front  —  veterans  from  Russia  —  suffi- 
cient to  outnumber  him  by  at  least  three  to  one. 


THE  ARGONAUTS  7 

That  should  suffice,  if  we  stand  by  our  decision 
about  casualties.  We  will  strike  hard  at  his  new 
positions,  before  his  artillery  has  had  time  to  regis- 
ter thoroughly.  We  will  annihilate  his  front  system 
of  trenches  by  an  intensive  bombardment,  while 
our  new  long-range  gas-shells  take  his  rest-billets  by 
surprise  and  demoralize  his  Divisional  and  Corps 
Reserves.  And  I  think,  Majesty,  that  we  have  been 
a  little  punctilious  about  things  hke  the  Red  Cross. 
After  all,  hospitals  are  a  mere  sentimental  handi- 
cap to  the  efficient  waging  of  war.  Our  new  bomb- 
ing aeroplanes  might  be  instructed  to  deal  faith- 
fully with  these,  especially  as  the  fool  English  have 
organized  no  preparation  for  their  defence.  Yes,  I 
—  we  —  Your  Majesty  will  drive  the  whole  pack 
of  them  into  the  sea  this  time!  The  French,  iso- 
lated, can  then  be  handled  at  leisure;  and  with  Cal- 
ais, Boulogne,  and  Havre  in  our  hands  the  Ameri- 
cans will  find  that  they  have  come  too  late.  In  fact, 
we  can  pick  them  off  as  they  arrive.  Thus  it  is  that 
Your  Majesty,  Uke  Caesar  and  Napoleon,  sepa- 
rates his  enemies  and  then  destroys  them  one  by 
one.  .  .  .  Dimde  et  Impera!  Exactly!  Most  happily 
put,  Your  Majesty!" 

And  it  was  so  —  up  to  a  point.  Ludendorff's 
plan  was  adopted.  The  necessary  concentration  of 
troops  was  effected  with  admirable  secrecy  and 
promptitude,  and  the  parallel  enterprises  of  sweep- 
ing the  British  Army  into  the  sea  and  expending  a 
million  German  hves  were  duly  inaugurated.  The 
latter    undertaking  succeeded    better    than    the 


8  THE  LAST  MILLION 

former:  the  line  sagged  and  wavered;  it  was  pushed 
here  and  there ;  but  it  never  broke.  Still,  the  strain 
was  terrible,  as  news  arrived  of  Monchy  gone, 
Wytschaete  gone,  Messines  gone,  Kemmel  gone;  of 
Bapaume,  Albert,  Armentieres,  Bailleul,  all  gone 
—  little  hills  and  little  towns  all  of  them,  but  big 
and  precious  in  certain  unimportant  eyes  because 
of  their  associations.  But  the  worst  news  never  ar- 
rived. Instead,  there  came  one  morning  the  tale  of 
an  all-day  assault  by  the  Hun,  deUvered  in  mass 
from  Meteren  to  Voormezeele,  every  wave  of  which 
had  been  broken  and  hurled  back  by  impregnable 
rocks  of  French  and  British  infantry.  So  disastrous 
was  the  failure  of  that  tremendous  lunge  that  the 
enemy  drew  off  with  his  dead  and  his  shame  for 
several  weeks,  and  the  non-stop  run  to  Calais  was 
withdrawn  from  the  time-table  until  further  notice. 

But  the  matter  could  not  be  left  here.  The  Boche 
had  laid  a  terrible  stake  on  the  table,  and  was 
bound  to  redeem  it  or  perish.  Plainly  he  would  try 
again  —  maybe  at  some  fresh  point;  but  again.  Al- 
ready there  were  mutterings  of  trouble  on  the 
French  Front.  That  he  would  break  the  line  —  the 
Une  which  he  had  failed  to  break  at  Verdun  in 
1916,  and  at  Ypres  in  1914  —  seemed  incredible; 
but  he  might  succeed  in  straining  it  beyond  the 
Hmits  of  perfect  recovery;  and  if  that  happened, 
Ludendorff's  boast  that  America  would  arrive  too 
late  might  be  justified. 

Hence  the  present  Armada.  It  is  only  one  of 
many.  Transports  have  been  crossing  the  Atlantic 
for  months  now,  but  never  upon  such  a  scale  as 


THE  ARGONAUTS  9 

this.  There  are  thousands  of  soldiers  in  this  convoy- 
alone  —  men  physically  splendid,  with  nearly  a 
year's  training  behind  thenl.  They  are  going  over 
—  Over  There  —  in  answer  to  the  call.  Russia  has 
stepped  out  of  the  scale,  so  America  must  step  in  at 
once  if  Prussianism  is  to  kick  the  beam.  Here  they 
are  —  a  sight  to  quicken  the  pulse  —  the  New 
World  hastening  to  redress  the  balance  of  the  Old. 


CHAPTER  TWO 

ship's  company 

However,  we  have  not  reached  our  destination 
yet;  which  is  just  as  well,  for  at  present  we  are  fully 
occupied  in  assimilating  our  new  surroundings.  To 
tell  the  truth,  some  of  us  have  a  good  deal  to  assimi- 
late. There  is  young  Boone  Cruttenden,  for  in- 
stance. 

Little  more  than  a  year  ago  he  was  preparing  to 
settle  down  in  his  ancestral  home  in  Kentucky, 
there  to  prop  the  declining  years  of  an  octogena- 
rian parent.  Colonel  Harvey  Cruttenden,  known 
in  far-back  Confederate  days  as  one  of  General 
Sam  Wheeler's  hardest-riding  disciples.  But  Presi- 
dent Wilson  had  upset  the  plans  of  Boone  Crutten- 
den for  all  time,  by  inviting  him  and  certain  others 
to  step  forward  and  help  make  the  World  Safe  for 
Democracy.  Boone  was  one  of  the  first  to  accept 
the  invitation. 

Several  strenuous  months  at  a  training-camp  of 
the  Reserve  Officers'  Training  Corps  followed,  and 
in  due  course  he  found  himself,  with  a  gilded  metal 
strip  on  either  shoulder,  communicating  his  slender 
knowledge  of  the  art  of  war  to  drafted  persons  who 
possessed  no  knowledge  of  the  subject  at  all  —  just 
as  thousands  of  other  young  men  of  the  right  spirit 
were  doing  all  over  the  country,  and  just  as  thou- 
sands of  other  young  men  of  similar  spirit  had  been 


SHIP'S  COMPANY  11 

doing  for  more  than  three  years  in  another  country 
three  thousand  miles  away. 

"It  was  something  fierce  at  fli'st,"  he  confided  to 
Miss  Frances  Lane,  a  United  States  Army  nurse, 
proceeding,  in  company  with  ninety-nine  others,  to 
a  Base  Hospital  in  France. 

By  rights  Miss  Lane  and  her  companions  should 
not  have  been  taking  chances  on  a  transport  at  all. 
She  should  have  been  crossing  the  Atlantic  in  a 
stately  white-painted  hospital  ship,  with  the  Red 
Cross  emblazoned  on  its  sides,  immune  by  all  the 
laws  of  God  and  Man  from  hostile  attack.  But  the 
Red  Cross  makes  the  Hun  see  red.  Therefore  it  is 
found  safer  in  these  days  to  adjust  life-jackets  over 
the  splints  and  bandages  of  wounded  men  and  send 
them  across  the  water,  together  with  the  indomita- 
ble sisterhood  which  tends  them,  protected  by 
something  that  makes  a  more  intelligible  appeal  to 
KuUur  than  the  mere  symbol  of  Christianity. 

"It  was  something  fierce,"  repeated  Boone 
Cruttenden. 

"Tell  me ! "  commanded  Miss  Lane,  with  an  air  of 
authority  which  Boone  found  extremely  attractive. 

"Well,  in  the  training-camps  the  main  proposi- 
tion was  to  make  the  boys  understand  what  they 
were  there  for.  They  were  full  of  enthusiasm,  but 
very  few  of  them  had  taken  any  interest  in  the  early 
part  of  the  war,  and  we  were  all  a  long  way  from 
Europe,  anyhow.  They  were  willing  enough  to 
fight,  but  naturally  they  wanted  to  know  what 
they  were  fighting  for.  Even  when  we  told  them, 
they  were  n't  too  wise.  Two  or  three  men  of  my 


12  THE  LAST  MILLION 

company  could  neither  read  nor  write;  another 
man  knew  the  name  of  his  home  town,  but  not  the 
name  of  his  State.  The  map  of  Europe  was  nothing 
in  his  young  hie.  Then,  lots  of  them  thought  we 
were  going  to  fight  the  Yankees  again,  and  whip 
them  this  time!" 

Boone's  eyes  flashed,  and  for  a  moment  he  for- 
got all  about  European  complications.  He  was  his 
father's  son  all  through.  But  a  certain  tensity  in 
the  atmosphere  recalled  him  to  realities. 

"I  guess  you  are  n't  a  Southerner?"  he  observed 
apologetically. 

"Massachusetts,"  replied  Miss  Lane  coldly. 

Boone  Cruttenden  offered  a  laboured  expression 
of  regret,  and  proceeded: 

"Then  they  did  n't  like  saluting,  or  obeying  or- 
ders on  the  jump.  Neither  did  I,  for  that  matter.  It 
seemed  undemocratic." 

"So  it  is,"  affirmed  Miss  Lane  sturdily. 

"Well,  I  don't  know.  We  certainly  made  much 
quicker  progress  with  our  training  once  we  had  got- 
ten the  idea.  Our  instructors  were  very  particular 
about  it,  too  —  both  French  and  British.  There 
was  an  English  sergeant  —  well,  the  boys  used  to 
come  i-unning  a  hundred  yards  to  see  him  salute  an 
officer.  I  tell  you,  it  tickled  them  to  death,  at  first. 
Next  thing,  they  were  all  trying  to  do  it  too." 

"What  was  it  like?" 

Boone  rose  from  his  seat  upon  the  deck,  stiffened 
his  young  muscles,  and  offered  a  very  creditable 
reproduction  of  the  epileptic  salute  of  the  British 
Guardsman. 


SHIP'S  COMPANY  13 

"Like  that,"  he  said. 

"I'm  not  surprised  they  ran,"  commented  Miss 
Lane. 

"Still,"  continued  Boone  appreciatively,  "that 
sergeant  was  a  bird.  At  the  start,  we  regarded  him 
as  a  pure  vaudeville  act.  He  talked  just  Hke  a  stage 
Englishman,  for  one  thing.  For  another,  a  Geiman 
bullet  had  gone  right  through  his  face  —  in  at 
one  cheek  and  out  at  the  other  —  and  that  did  n't 
help  make  a  William  Jennings  Bryan  of  him.  But 
William  J.  had  nothing  on  him;  neither  had  Will 
Rogers,  for  that  .matter.  He  would  stand  there  in 
front  of  us  and  put  over  a  line  of  stuff  that  made 
everybody  weak  with  laughing  —  everybody,  that 
is,  except  the  fellow  he  was  talking  to.  I  shall  never 
forget  the  first  morning  we  held  an  Officers'  In- 
struction Class.  There  were  about  forty  of  us.  Old 
man  Duckett  —  that  was  his  name;  Sergeant  In- 
structor Duckett  —  marched  us  around,  and  put 
us  through  our  paces.  We  meant  to  show  him  some- 
thing —  we  were  a  chesty  bunch  in  those  days  — 
so  we  gave  him  what  we  imagined  was  a  first-class 
West  Point  show.  (Not  that  any  of  us  had  been  at 
West  Point.)  When  we  had  done  enough,  he  lined 
us  up,  and  said :  '  Well,  gentlemen,  I  have  run  over 
your  points,  and  before  dismissin'  the  parade  I 
should  like  to  say  that  I  only  wish  the  President  of 
the  United  States  was  here  to  see  you.  If  he  did 
catch  sight  of  you,  I  know  that  his  first  words  would 
be  —  "  Thank  Gawd,  from  the  bottom  of  my  heart, 
we've  got  a  Navy!"'" 
To  Boone  and  Miss  Lane  now  enter  others. 


14  THE  LAST  MILLION 

(This  is  a  trial  to  which  Master  Boone  is  growing 
accustomed,  for  Miss  Lane  is  quite  the  prettiest 
girl  on  the  ship.)  Among  them  we  note  one  Jim 
Nichols,  who,  previous  to  America's  entry  into  the 
War,  has  worked  upon  the  New  Orleans  Cotton 
Exchange  ''ever  since  he  can  remember."  There  is 
also  Major  Powers,  wearing  the  ribbon  of  the  Span- 
ish War  medal.  There  are  two  Naval  officers,  cross- 
ing over  to  pursue  submarines.  Until  they  begin, 
Miss  Lane  makes  a  very  pleasant  substitute.  And 
there  is  a  British  officer  who  walks  with  a  Hmp  — 
Captain  Norton  —  returning  from  a  spell  of  duty 
as  MiUtary  Instructor  in  a  Texas  training-camp. 

Miss  Lane,  with  the  instinct  of  a  true  hostess, 
turns  to  the  stranger. 

"We  were  talking  about  our  rookies,  Captain," 
she  announces.  "How  did  they  compare  with  your 
Kitchener's  Army?" 

"Very  much  the  same.  Miss  Lane,  in  the  early 
days.  Fish  out  of  the  water,  all  of  them.  We  had  all 
sorts  —  miners,  shipbuilders,  farm-hands,  railway- 
men,  newspaper-boys  —  and  not  one  of  them  knew 
the  smallest  thing  about  soldiering.  They  knew 
pretty  well  everything  else,  I  admit.  The  ranks 
were  chock-full  of  experts  —  engineers,  plumbers, 
electricians,  glass-blowers,  printers,  musicians.  I 
remember  one  of  my  men  put  himself  down  as  an 
'  egg-tester '  —  whatever  that  may  be !  An  actor, 
perhaps.  But  hardly  one  of  them  knew  his  right 
foot  from  his  left  when  it  came  to  forming  fours." 

" Same  here,"  said  Major  Powers.  "My  first  con- 
signment of  drafted  men  was  a  mixture  of  moun- 


SHIP'S  COMPANY  15 

taineers  from  Tennessee  —  moonshiners,  most  of 
them  —  and  East- Side  Jews  from  New  York. 
(I  wonder  who  the  blue-eyed  boy  at  Washington 
was  who  mixed  'em!)  The  moonshiners  looked  the 
hardest  lot  of  cases  you  ever  set  eyes  on:  they  hated 
discipline  worse  than  poison;  and  an  officer  was 
about  as  popular  with  them  as  a  skunk  at  a  picnic. 
But  they  were  as  easy  as  pie:  they  were  scared  to 
death  half  the  time,  by  —  what  do  you  think?" 

"The  water-wagon?"  suggested  a  voice. 

''No  —  of  getting  lost!  They  could  have  found 
their  way  blindfold  over  their  own  hills  back  home; 
but  they  had  never  lived  on  a  street  before,  and 
those  huge  camps  had  them  paralyzed.  They  said 
the  huts  were  all  exactly  aUke  —  which  was  true 
enough  —  and  not  one  of  them  would  stray  fifty 
yards  from  his  own  for  fear  he  would  not  find  it 
again.  Curious,  is  n't  it?" 

''Yes.  Almost  exactly  what  happened  with  our 
Scottish  Highlanders,"  said  Norton.  "But  they 
took  quite  kindly  to  city  life  in  the  end.  Regular 
clubmen,  in  fact.  What  about  your  East-Siders? " 

"They  were  a  more  difficult  proposition,"  said 
Powers.  "In  the  first  place,  they  didn't  want  to 
fight  at  all,  whereas  the  moonshiners  did.  In  fact, 
the  moonshiners  did  n't  care  whom  they  fought,  so 
long  as  they  fought  somebody.  They  were  Hke  the 
Irishman  who  asked : '  Is  this  a  private  fight,  or  can 
anybody  join  in?'  But  the  East-Siders  were  differ- 
ent. Their  discipline  was  right  enough:  in  fact,  the 
average  East-Side  rookie  usually  acted  towards  an 
officer  as  if  he  wanted  to  sell  him  something.  But 


16  THE  LAST  MILLION 

they  were  city  birds,  born  and  bred.  They  were  ac- 
customed to  behave  well  when  a  cop  was  in  sight; 
but  once  around  the  corner  you  could  not  have 
trusted  them  with  their  own  salary.  They  did  n't 
like  country  life,  and  they  did  n't  like  the  dark. 
They  were  never  really  happy  away  from  a  street 
with  illuminated  signs  on  it  —  and  there  are  n't 
many  of  those  in  Texas.  If  you  put  one  of  the  bunch 
on  sentry  duty  by  himself  in  a  lonely  place,  like  as 
not  he'd  get  so  scared  he'd  go  skating  around  the 
outskirts  of  the  camp  looking  for  cover.  I  once 
rounded  up  four  of  my  sentries  from  different  posts, 
all  together  in  one  pool-room.  But  discipline  has 
them  nicely  fixed  now.  By  the  way,  you  hea^d  the 
story  of  the  Jew  doughboy  whose  friends  recom- 
mended him  to  take  a  Commission?  " 

'*  No.  Tell  me  !  "  commanded  Miss  Lane. 

"He  refused,  on  the  ground  that  it  would  be  too 
difficult  to  collect.  He  said  he  might  not  be  able 
to  keep  tally  of  all  the  Germans  he  killed:  besides, 
his  General  might  not  believe  him.  Anyway,  he 
preferred  a  straight  salary!  Tell  us  some  more  of 
your  experiences.  Captain." 

"They  were  much  the  same  as  yours,"  said 
Norton.  ''The  trouble  with  Kitchener's  Army  was 
that  practically  every  member  of  the  rank-and-file 
enlisted  under  the  firm  belief  that  Kitchener  would 
simply  hand  him  a  rifle  and  ammunition  and  pack 
him  off  right  away  to  the  Front  —  whatever  that 
might  be  —  to  shoot  the  Kaiser.  Their  experiences 
during  the  first  six  months  —  chiefly  a  course  of 
instruction  in  obedience  and  sobriety  —  was  a  bit 


SHIP'S  COMPANY  17 

of  a  jolt  to  them.  But  discipline  told  in  the  end.  To- 
day I  believe  most  of  them  would  rather  have  a 
strict  officer  than  an  officer  they  could  do  what 
they  liked  with.  Leniency  usually  means  ineffi- 
ciency; and  inefficiency  at  the  top  of  things  usually 
means  irregular  meals  and  regular  casualties  for 
the  men  underneath!" 

"What  do  you  include  under  discipline,  Cap- 
tain?" enquired  that  upholder  of  personal  liberty, 
Miss  Lane,  suspiciously. 

''Little  things,  chiefly  —  things  that  don't  seem 
to  matter  much.  Shaving,  and  tidiness  — " 

''What,  in  a  trench?"  asked  several  young  offi- 
cers. But  Major  Powers  nodded  his  head  approv- 
ingly. 

"That  is  just  what  most  of  us  ask  who  don't 
know,"  he  said.  "But  I  have  seen  enough  service  to 
have  learned  one  thing,  and  that  is  that  a  dirty  sol- 
dier is  a  bad  soldier,  all  the  world  over.  If  a  man 
is  encouraged  to  neglect  his  personal  appearance, 
he  starts  to  neglect  his  work  —  gets  careless  with 
the  cleaning  of  his  rifle,  and  so  forth.  If  a  man 
takes  no  pride  in  his  appearance,  he  takes  no  pride 
in  his  duty.  The  other  way  round,  the  best  soldier 
is  the  soldier  who  keeps  himself  smart." 

"That  is  just  what  I  think,"  interpolated  Miss 
Lane,  virtuously.  (She  had  succeeded  during  the 
Major's  homily  in  surreptitiously  powdering  her 
nose,  and  felt  ready  to  take  Florence  Nightingale's 
place  at  a  moment's  notice.) 

"We  certainly  found  it  so,"  said  Norton.  "In 
fact,  after  a  short  experience  of  trench  warfare  we 


18  THE  LAST  MILLION 

revived  all  the  old  peace-time  stunts.  The  order  was 
given  that  every  man  in  the  trenches  was  to  be 
shaved  by  a  certain  hour  each  day.  (Of  course,  if 
the  Boche  attacked  in  mass,  the  ceremony  was  lia- 
ble to  postponement.)  In  billets  behind  the  hne 
every  one  was  expected  to  make  himself  as  smart 
as  possible  —  brush  his  uniform,  shine  his  shoes, 
and  so  on.  The  band  played  for  an  hour  every  eve- 
ning. Saluting  and  other  little  ceremonies  hke  that 
were  insisted  on.  These  things  all  together  had  a  tre- 
mendous effect.  I  don't  know  why,  but  it  was  so. 
For  one  thing,  it  made  life  behind  the  hues  more 
tolerable  —  more  refreshing.  In  the  hne  itself,  it 
made  officers  more  concise  in  giving  their  orders, 
and  men  more  alert  and  intelligent  in  carrying 
them  out.  In  fact,  the  greater  the  fuss  a  regiment 
made  about  its  appearance  —  'eye-wash,'  we 
called  it  —  the  better  its  work  in  the  field." 

"Things  worked  out  that  way  with  us  too,  even 
in  home  training,"  corroborated  Powers. 

"  So  I  noticed.  I  was  in  four  or  five  big  camps,  in 
different  States,  and  I  found  that  the  rate  of  prog- 
ress in  training  varied  almost  directly  with  the  dis- 
cipline." 

''Which  camp  did  you  like  best?" 
The  British  officer  turned  to  Miss  Lane,  and 
shook  his  head.  "No,  you  don't,  Miss  Lane!"  he 
replied.  "I  belong  to  the  most  tactless  race  in  the 
world,  but  I  know  enough  to  keep  out  of  trouble 
of  that  kind!  I  had  a  gorgeous  time  in  all  of  them." 
At  this  point  a  timely  bugle  blew  for  boat  drill, 
and  the  harassed  veteran  stumped  off. 


SHIP'S  COMPANY  19 

Boat  drill  occurs  at  frequent  intervals,  and  is 
still  sufficient  of  a  novelty  to  be  regarded  as  an 
amusement. 

By  all,  that  is,  except  the  habitues  —  the  crew, 
the  stewards,  and  that  anaemic  race  of  troglodytes 
which  only  emerges  from  the  lower  depths  of  the 
ship  under  the  stress  of  great  emergency  —  the 
army  of  dish-washers  and  potato-peelers.  These 
fall  in  at  their  posts  with  the  half-ashamed  self- 
consciousness  of  big  boys  who  have  been  com- 
pelled by  an  undiscriminating  hostess  to  partici- 
pate in  children's  games.  They  grin  sheepishly, 
shiver  ostentatiously  in  the  fresh  breeze,  and  offer 
profane  but  amusing  comments  in  an  undertone  to 
one  another. 

But  few  of  the  present  passengers  have  ever 
been  on  board  a  ship  before.  Indeed,  many  of  us 
never  saw  the  ocean  until  last  week.  War  and  its 
appurtenances  are  for  the  present  a  game,  full  of 
interesting  surprises  and  wonderful  thrills.  It  is 
surprising,  for  instance,  however  good  your  appe- 
tite may  have  been  in  camp,  to  find  how  much 
more  you  can  eat  on  board  ship ;  and  it  is  thriUing, 
if  you  happen  to  be  a  rustic  beauty  from  a  very 
small  town  in  Central  Iowa,  to  find  yourself  danc- 
ing the  one-step,  in  a  life-jacket,  with  a  total 
stranger  in  uniform,  upon  an  undulating  deck  to 
the  music  of  a  full  mihtary  band. 

So  most  of  us  have  entered  upon  the  business 
with  all  the  misguided  enthusiasm  of  the  gentle- 
man who  once  blacked  himself  all  over  to  play 
''Othello."  Some  of  us  sleep  in  our  clothes;  others 


20  THE  LAST  MILLION 

carry  all  their  valuables  about  their  person;  not  a 
few  donned  patent  hfe-saving  contraptions  before 
we  cleared  Sandy  Hook.  But  no  one  appears  the 
least  nervous:  there  is  a  pleasurable  excitement 
about  everything.  And  we  listen  with  intense  re- 
spect to  the  blood-curdUng  reminiscences  of  the 
crew,  particularly  the  stewards.  All  our  cabin 
stewards  have  been  torpedoed  at  least  three  times, 
and  every  single  one  of  them  was  on  board  the 
Lusitania  when  she  was  sunk.  The  survivors  of  the 
Lusitania  must  be  almost  as  numerous  by  this 
time  as  the  original  ship's  company  of  the  May- 
flower. 


CHAPTER  THREE 

THE  LOWER  DECK 

If  you  clamber  down  the  accommodation  ladder 
on  to  the  well-deck  amidships,  you  will  find  your- 
self in  a  world  which  will  enable  you  to  contemplate 
War  from  yet  another  angle. 

For  a  guide  and  director  I  can  confidently  rec- 
ommend Mr.  Al  Thompson,  late  of  Springfield, 
Illinois — ''No,  sir,  not  Massachusetts!"  he  will 
be  careful  to  infonn  you  —  now  a  seasoned  orna- 
ment of  a  Trench  Mortar  Battery. 

"We  sure  are  one  dandy  outfit,"  he  observes 
modestly.  "Two  hundred  roughnecks!  I'll  make 
you  known  to  a  few.  There's  Eddie  Gillette:  you 
seen  him  box  last  night,  out  on  the  forward  deck 
there?  Yep?  Well,  you  certainly  seen  something!" 

We  certainly  had.  Boxing  is  an  ideal  pastime  for 
a  large,  virile,  and  closely  packed  community,  for 
several  reasons.  In  the  first  place,  it  requires  very 
little  space.  A  twelve-foot  ring  will  do:  indeed, 
towards  the  end  of  an  exciting  bout  the  combat- 
ants can — or  must — make  shift  with  mere  elbow- 
room.  In  the  second,  the  novice  extracts  quite  as 
much  exercise  and  excitement  from  the  sport  as 
the  expert  —  possibly  more.  Thu"dly  and  most  im- 
portant, boxing  fulfils  the  cardinal  principle  of 
providing  for  the  greatest  good  of  the  greatest 
number,  because  it  affords  far  more  undiluted  hap- 
piness to  the  spectators  than  to  the  performers. 


22  THE  LAST  MILLION 

Last  night,  for  instance,  when  Mr.  Hank  Magraw 
(weight  two  hundred  pounds),  a  gladiator  mainly 
conspicuous  for  unruffled  urbanity  and  entire  igno- 
rance of  the  rules  of  boxing,  growing  a  trifle  restive 
under  the  cumulative  effect  of  three  consecutive 
taps  upon  the  point  of  the  chin  from  an  opponent 
half  his  size,  suddenly  gathered  that  gentleman 
into  his  arms  and  endeavoured  to  stuff  him  down 
one  of  those  tnmipet-mouthed  ventilators  which 
lead  to  the  stokehold,  the  spectators  voiced  their 
appreciation  by  a  vociferous  encore. 

A  wonderful  sight  these  spectators  are.  They  are 
banked  up  all  around  the  well-deck,  forming  a 
deep  pit,  in  the  bottom  of  which  two  boxers  gy- 
rate, clash,  and  recoil  like  nutshells  in  a  whirlpool. 
Tier  upon  tier  they  rise  —  with  their  long,  lean, 
American  bodies,  and  tense,  brown,  American 
faces  —  seated  in  concentric  circles  on  the  deck 
itself,  perched  on  hatches  and  deck-houses  and  sky- 
Hghts,  clinging  to  davits  and  ventilators,  or  hang- 
ing in  clusters  from  the  rigging  —  all  yelling  them- 
selves hoarse. 

The  ''announcer"  —  one  Buck  Stamper  — 
stands  for  the  moment  at  the  bottom  of  the  vortex. 
With  each  of  his  muscular  arms  he  encircles  the 
shrinking  figure  of  a  competitor,  and  introduces 
the  pair  to  the  audience. 

''Boys,"  he  bellows,  in  a  voice  which  must  be 
easily  audible  in  the  surrounding  transports,  "one 
of  the  English  officers  up  there  has  come  across 
with  —  with  —  a  ten-shiUing  certificate"  —  he  re- 
leases one  of  his  proteges  in  order  to  display  a  pink- 


THE  LOWER  DECK  23 

and- white  British  treasury  note  —  'Ho  be  awarded 
to  the  winner  of  this  bout." 

There  is  a  little  polite  applause.  Then  a  stento- 
rian voice  enquires: 

''How  much  is  that  —  in  money?" 

There  is  a  great  roar  of  laughter.  The  announcer 
retires,  to  seek  an  expert  financier.  A  British  ma- 
rine enlightens  him,  and  he  announces : 

"'Bout  two  dollars-and-a-half.  On  my  right  I 
have  Ikey  Zingbaum,  of  the  Field  Ambulance  — " 

The  immediate  conjunction  of  Ikey  Zingbaum 
and  two-and-a-half  dollars  appeals  to  the  crowd's 
sense  of  humour.  When  they  have  recovered,  Buck 
Stamper  proceeds: 

"On  my  left"  —  he  thrusts  forward  a  smooth- 
chinned,  pink-cheeked,  lusty,  country  lad —  "Miss 
Sissy  Smithers,  what  has  got  in  among  the  boys  by 
niistake!" 

Amid  yells  of  deHght  the  blushing  Sissy  shakes 
hands  with  his  tallow-faced  opponent,  and  falls 
promptly  upon  his  neck.  The  pair,  locked  in  a 
complicated  embrace,  circle  slowly  round  the  ring, 
feebly  patting  one  another  on  the  back.  At  the  ur- 
gent suggestion  of  the  spectators  the  referee  sepa- 
rates them,  caustically  observing  that  this  is  a  fight 
and  not  a  fox-trot.  For  a  short  time  they  stand  un- 
easily apart;  then  Ikey  Zingbaum,  stimulated  pos- 
sibly by  his  supporters'  constant  references  to  the 
ten-shilling  certificate,  leans  suddenly  forward  and 
boxes  his  opponent's  ears.  Miss  Sissy,  stung  into 
indignant  activity,  lunges  out  with  all  his  strength 
and  counters  fairly  and  squarely  in  the  pit  of  Ikey's 


24  THE  LAST  MILLION 

stomach.  Mr.  Zingbaum  shuts  up  Hke  a  footrule, 
and  shoots  stern-foremost  into  the  thick  of  the 
audience.  He  is  extracted  amid  shouts  of  laughter, 
groaning  horribly,  and  receives  first  aid  from  a 
dozen  willing  but  inexperienced  hands.  Presently 
he  recovers  sufficiently  far  to  be  informed  that  he 
has  been  awarded  the  match  —  on  a  foul.  Miss 
Sissy,  not  ill-pleased  with  himself,  modestly  disap- 
pears. 

"Yes,"  continued  Al  Thompson,  "you  seen 
something.  Was  you  there  when  Eddie  Gillette  fit 
that  duck  what  we  call  Coca-Kola?  No?  I'm 
sorry.  Coca-Kola 's  a  Turk.  Comes  from  Turkey,  I 
mean.  Las'  winter,  when  he  was  fighting  around 
the  Bowery,  he  woiild  eat  raw  meat  whenever  he 
could  get  it.  Said  it  kept  him  kinder  fit.  Anyway, 
he  was  put  up  las'  night  against  Eddie  Gillette.  We 
picked  on  Ed  because  he  was  the  best  man  in  the 
Trench  Mortar  Section,  and  Coca-Kola  had  been 
winning  out  all  the  time  for  the  Machine  Gunners, 
where  he  belonged,  and  they  was  blowing  some. 
Ed  was  giving  away  more  than  seventeen  pounds  of 
weight,  besides  which  the  Turk  was  the  sort  of  guy 
that  if  he  was  short  of  money  he  would  go  up  to  a 
person  an'  say:  'You  give  me  two  bits  and  I'll  let 
you  hit  me  on  the  jaw  any  place  you  like!'  That 
was  the  kind  of  lobster  Coca-Kola  was,  and  gives 
you  some  sort  of  an  idea  what  Ed  was  up  against! 

"The  match  was  to  be  ten  rounds  of  two  min- 
utes each.  There  was  five  dollars  donated  by  an 
officer  for  the  winner,  and  some  powerful  side-bets. 
But  it  was  all  over  in  one  round.  Eddie  started  by 


THE  LOWER  DECK  25 

rushing  in  and  giving  the  Turk  a  silly  little  tap  on 
the  nose.  That  seemed  to  get  the  Turk's  goat,  for 
he  went  for  Eddie  like  a  cyclone,  and  rushed  him 
all  around  the  ring  for  maybe  a  minute.  At  the  end 
of  that  he  gave  him  a  blow  on  the  body  that  laid 
him  flat  on  the  deck.  We  all  thought  Eddie  was 
gone  for  sure.  The  tune-keeper  had  counted  up  to 
five  before  he  come  to  hfe  at  all.  Then  he  began  to 
recover,  very  slow.  At  'seven'  he  rolled  over  on  his 
face.  The  Turk,  reckoning  that  Eddie  was  too  dopy 
to  go  on  any  more,  just  straddled  around  in  the 
middle  of  the  ring,  looking  up  to  the  deck  above 
for  the  officer  that  was  donating  the  five  bucks. 
But  at  'nine'  Eddie  was  on  his  feet  again,  hke  a 
streak.  No  one  hardly  saw  him  get  up.  All  they  did 
see  was  Eddie  soak  the  Turk  under  the  point  of  the 
jaw  —  which  was  well  up  in  the  air  at  the  time. 
Coca-Kola  fairly  knocked  a  groan  out  of  the  deck 
when  he  struck  it.  It  took  them  two  hours  to  bring 
him  round.  Gee,  but  it  was  some  soak !  Some  of  the 
Machine  Gun  boys  cut  open  Eddie's  glove  after, 
because  they  suspicioned  he  might  have  a  chunk  of 
lead  there.  But  there  were  n't  nothing  there.  No, 
sir!  Nothing  but  Eddie's  little  old  punch'." 

We  are  presented  both  to  the  victorious  Eddie 
and  the  dethroned  masticator  of  raw  meat.  The 
latter  is  inchned  to  be  taciturn;  but  the  former, 
true  to  national  use  and  custom,  is  quite  ready  to 
be  interviewed. 

Yes,  this  is  his  first  trip  across,  but  he  is  not  sea- 
sick, and  does  not  expect  to  be.  Reason;  he  has 
spent  twelve  years  on  the  Great  Lakes,  and  a  man 


26  THE  LAST  MILLION 

that  can  stand  the  up-and-down  convulsions  of, 
say,  Lake  Michigan  during  a  winter  storm,  need 
not  fear  the  spacious  roll  of  the  Atlantic. 

''There's  a  ten-thousand-ton  ship  has  went 
down  there  before  now,"  says  Eddie,  referring  ap- 
parently to  Lake  Michigan,  "just  because  them 
twisty  seas  has  sheered  the  heads  clean  off  her  bolts 
and  opened  her  up.  Kinder  ripped  her,  I  guess. 
Every  October  owners  raises  the  pay  of  all  hands 
on  them  ships  fifteen  per  cent  —  raises  it  volun- 
tary." 

''Why?" 

"Because  the  whole  bunch  would  quit  if  they 
didn't!" 

This  does  not  sound  like  a  very  convincing  ex- 
ample of  the  voluntary  system;  but  the  great  are 
permitted  to  be  inconsistent.  Mr.  Gillette,  pro- 
ceeding, considers  that  Hfe  on  board  this  ship  is 
tolerable,  but  the  food  monotonous.  Another  gen- 
tleman, chewing  tobacco,  now  joins  the  sympo- 
sium. He  is  introduced  as  Joe  McCarthy,  of  Okla- 
homa. 

"You  said  it!"  he  announces,  referring  appar- 
ently to  the  food  question.  "Especially  the  coffee. 
The  stuff  they  serve  on  board  this  packet  ain't  got 
no  kick  to  it." 

He  is  reminded  that  he  has  passed  out  of  the 
coffee  belt,  and  that  he  is  approaching  a  land  of 
tea- drinkers. 

"Tea  or  coffee,"  he  rejoins,  with  the  dogged  per- 
sistence of  the  professional  grumbler,  "it  don't 
make  no  difference  to  me.  And  another  thing.  This 


THE  LOWER  DECK  27 

yer  travelling  by  sea  is  a  lonesome  business.  Give 
me  a  railroad !  There  you  can  look  out  of  the  win- 
dow of  the  car  and  see  folks  waving  their  hands 
to  you;  and  presents  of  candy  at  the  deepo,  and 
everything.  While  this"  —  he  flings  a  disparaging 
glance  over  the  heaving  Atlantic  —  "this  is  all  the 
same,  all  the  time!" 

''Well,  Joe,"  explains  the  fair-minded  Al  Thomp- 
son, "I  guess  we  got  to  travel  to  Europe  this  way, 
seeing  there  ain't  no  railroad  across  —  leastways 
not  at  present." 

But  Mr.  McCarthy  refuses  to  be  comforted. 

"Europe!"  he  exclaims.  "There  y'  are!  Europe 
—  four  thousand  miles  from  America !  Some  folks 
must  be  darned  anxious  for  war,  if  they  got  to  send 
us  four  thousand  miles  to  find  it! " 

This  last  sentiment  produces  a  distinct  sensa- 
tion. It  is  adjudged  by  those  who  hear  it  to  border 
on  pro-Germanism.  Heads  turn  sharply  in  Joe's 
direction.  A  certain  licence  is  permitted  to  pro- 
fessional grouchers;  but  "knocking"  the  Cause  is 
the  one  thing  that  the  New  Crusaders  will  not  per- 
mit. 

That  simple-hearted  American,  Al  Thompson, 
conveys  the  necessary  reproof,  in  a  manner  which 
more  highly-placed  diplomatists  might  envy. 

"Listen,  Joe,"  he  remarks:  "that  stuff  don't  go 
here.  I  know  you  been  mighty  seasick,  and  you're 
sore  on  the  food,  and  the  monotony,  and  the  other 
little  glooms  that  come  around  on  a  slow  trip  like 
this.  But  whenever  /  git  sore  on  things  just  now, 
Uke  we  all  do,  I  just  remember  them  dirty  bums 


28  THE  LAST  MILLION 

over  there  marching  through  Belgium  with  Uttle 
babies  on  their  bayonets;  and  then  —  well,  all  I 
care  about  is  getting  over  there  and  killing  any  guy 
that  calls  himself  a  Dutchman.  Let  me  kill  a  few 
of  them  first  —  and,  even  if  they  kill  me  after,  I 
should  worry!" 


CHAPTER  FOUR 

THE  DANGER  ZONE 

There  are  many  other  types  on  board.  Here  is  one 
at  your  elbow.  He  is  a  sentry,  on  Number  Nine 
post.  His  duties  appear  to  be  confined  to  scruti- 
nizing the  ocean  for  periscopes.  This  is  not  a  very 
arduous  task,  for  we  are  not  in  the  danger  zone  at 
present.  Indeed,  a  good  deal  of  this  sentry's  time 
appears  to  be  spent  in  gazing  over  the  tafTrail 
towards  t^he  setting  sun  —  towards  America.  Pos- 
sibly he  ought  to  be  straining  his  eyes  towards 
France.  But  we  are  all  human,  especially  the 
American  soldier  boy,  and  this  boy  is  unaffectedly 
and  avowedly  homesick.  Jim  Cleaver's  thoughts 
at  the  present  moment  are  nowhere  near  Number 
Nine  post;  they  are  centred  upon  a  little  township 
called  Potsdam,  far  away.  This  sounds  good  and 
blood-thirsty:  unfortunately  this  particular  Pots- 
dam is  not  in  Prussia,  but  "way  up"  somewhere  in 
the  State  of  New  York;  and  Jim's  imagination  is 
concerned  less  with  the  House  of  Hohenzollern 
than  with  the  House  of  Cleaver  —  particularly  the 
feminine  portion  thereof.  Moreover,  it  happens  to 
be  Sunday  evening;  and  we  all  know  what  that 
means. 

At  the  other  corner  of  the  deck  stands  Antonio. 
That  is  not  his  real  name,  but  no  matter.  He  will 
inform  you  that  he  has  already  crossed  the  ocean 
—  once.  A  brief  exercise  in  mental  arithmetic  will 


30  THE  LAST  MILLION 

presently  cause  you  to  realize  that  Antonio  cannot 
have  been  born  in  America.  This  is  so.  He  crossed 
over  ten  years  ago,  in  the  steerage  of  an  Austrian 
Lloyd  liner,  outward  bound  from  Trieste,  on  his 
way  from  the  sunny  but  unremunerative  plains  of 
Lombardy,  in  search  of  a  mysterious  Eldorado 
called  Harlem,  New  York.  And  now  here  he  is, 
aged  twenty-six,  picked  out  by  the  groping  hand  of 
the  Selective  Draft,  on  his  way  back  again,  to  help 
rend  those  same  plains  (among  others)  from  the 
Hun  and  restore  them  to  their  rightful  owners.  He 
is  quite  cheerful  at  the  prospect,  though  he  would 
sooner  be  with  the  ItaUan  Army  than  with  the 
American.  Not  that  he  is  lacking  in  patriotism 
towards  the  land  of  his  adoption,  but  — 

'T  gotta  two  brother  over  there,"  he  explains. 
"Besides,  here  I  gotta  talka  da  Ingleese.  Alia  same, 
Ifeelafine!" 

Antonio  is  not  the  only  man  who  is  going  back 
with  a  personal  interest  in  the  European  situation. 
On  a  coil  of  rope  on  the  well-deck,  broad-faced  and 
Turanian,  sits  another  young  man.  If  Antonio's 
real  name  is  difficult  to  pronounce,  this  man's  is 
out  of  range  altogether;  for  he  is  a  Russian.  He 
is  addressed  indifferently  as  Clambakovitch  or 
Roughneckski. 

*T  live  fifty  miles  from  German  border,"  he 
says.  *T  come  over  here  seven  years  ago:  I  go 
through  Berlin  and  sail  from  Hamburg.  Now  the 
Germans  have  my  home.  I  do  not  hear  from  my 
people  for  three  years.  So  now  I  go  home  — 
through  Berlin  again! " 


THE  DANGER  ZONE  31 

"And  after  that?" 

After  that,  Clambakovitch  Roughneckski's  plans 
are  perfectly  definite.  He  is  coming  back  to  Amer- 
ica —  for  good.  Already  he  is  wedded  to  the  soil 
of  Pennsylvania.  Antonio's  views  are  the  same. 

The  affection  of  her  children  for  America  is  a 
wonderful  thing.  Domestic  or  imported,  it  makes 
no  matter.  To  the  native-born  American,  America 
is  still  the  little  country  —  the  little  strip  of  coast- 
line —  which  stood  up  successfully  to  a  dunder- 
headed  monarch  in  days  when  men  did  not  govern 
themselves:  to  the  naturahzed  American,  America 
is  the  land  which  gave  him  his  first  real  taste  of 
personal  hberty.  Each  cherishes  America  to-day  — 
the  one  because  he  helped  to  make  her  free,  the 
other  because  she  has  made  him  free. 

We  are  in  the  danger  zone  now.  It  is  difficult  to 
realize  that  thrilling  circumstance,  because  no  one 
seems  to  worry  at  all. 

The  same  games  of  shuffle-board,  bull-board, 
chess,  checkers,  and  bridge  are  in  progress;  each 
day  sees  the  same  guard-mountings,  parades,  and 
inspections ;  off  duty,  the  same  quantity  of  tobacco 
and  chewing-gum  is  being  consumed.  Only  if  the 
ship  is  brought  up  short  by  a  heavy  sea,  or  an  iron 
door  clangs  suddenly  in  some  distant  stokehold, 
are  we  conscious  of  any  tension  at  all.  For  a  mo- 
ment heads  are  turned,  or  conversation  breaks.  But 
that  is  all.  A  year  ago,  old  hands  tell  us,  things  were 
different.  There  really  was  cause  for  nervousness. 
But  now,  we  are  escorted,  we  are  well-armed,  and 
the  worst  we  need  fear  is  a  few  hours  in  the  boats. 


32  THE  LAST  MILLION 

There  is  much  speculation  as  to  our  destination. 
Is  it  the  Mersey;  the  Clyde;  Queenstown?  Or 
France  direct?  Where  are  we  now,  anyway?  Each 
noon,  when  the  ship's  officers  appear  upon  the 
bridge  in  a  body,  and  perform  mysterious  sun- 
worshipping  rites  with  sextants,  the  amateur  ex- 
perts look  knowing,  and  refer  darkly  to  probable 
latitudes  and  longitudes.  One,  diagnosing  the  pres- 
ent commotion  of  billows  as  a  "ground-swell,"  an- 
nounces positively  that  we  are  just  off  the  Bay  of 
Biscay.  Another,  basing  his  conclusions  upon  the 
lengthening  hours  of  daylight  and  the  presence  in 
our  wake  of  certain  sea-birds  (herring-gulls,  really) 
which  he  describes  as  ''penguins,"  announces  con- 
fidently that  we  are  now  well  within  the  Arctic 
Circle  and  will  ultimately  fetch  a  compass  to 
Aberdeen,  via  Iceland.  The  battle  rages  between 
these  two  extremes:  probably  a  carefully  worked- 
out  average  of  opinion  would  bring  us  somewhere 
near  the  truth.  Gunners  are  quite  familiar  with  the 
process:  they  call  it  "bracketing."  But  it  does  not 
matter.  The  real  fun  will  begin  when  we  sight  land, 
and  the  authorities  upon  the  subject  start  in  to 
identify  it. 

Another  night  has  passed,  and  the  question  is 
settled.  We  have  sighted  land,  and  are  informed 
that  we  may  expect  to  make  our  port  to-night.  It  is 
a  breathless  summer  morning,  and  our  great  ships, 
which  looked  forlorn  and  insignificant  amid  the 
ocean  wastes,  appear  to  have  swelled  a  good  deal 
during  the  night.  Certainly  we  form  a  stately  pag- 
eant, for  our  escorting  forces  have  been  augmented. 


THE  DANGER  ZONE  33 

Destroyers  are  beating  the  bounds,  nosey  little 
patrol-boats  thread  their  way  in  and  out  of  the 
flotilla;  silver-grey  monsters  float  above  our  heads 
in  the  blue,  occasionally  descending  to  dip  a  sus- 
picious nose  towards  the  glittering  wavelets.  One 
of  them  dives  down  gi-acefully  to  within  hailing 
distance  of  our  own  ship.  It  is  a  sublime  moment. 
A  thousand  Stetsons  are  waved  in  welcome,  and 
an  earnest  query  —  the  spontaneous  greeting  of 
Young  America  to  Old  England  —  is  roared  from 
one  of  our  portholes: 

"Say,  you  got  any  beer  up  there?" 

At  the  forward  end  of  the  boat-deck  Boone 
Cruttenden  and  Miss  Lane  were  leaning  over  the 
rail,  in  that  confidential  conjunction  invariable  in 
all  young  couples,  whether  in  war  or  peace,  on  the 
last  day  of  a  voyage.  Boone's  blue  eyes  surveyed 
the  scene  around  him,  and  glowed. 

*'It  makes  you  think  a  bit!"  he  exclaimed. 
"Here  we  are,  thousands  of  us  Americans,  on 
board  British  ships,  being  convoyed  into  a  British 
port  by  the  British  Navy.  I  wish  the  old  Kaiser 
was  here!  And  I  wish  some  of  our  folks  at  home 
who  are  asking  what  the  British  Navy  is  doing  in 
this  war  could  be  here  too !  They  might  learn  then 
what  is  meant  by  the  freedom  of  the  seas! " 

"Still,"  complained  the  youthful  seeker  after 
sensation,  Miss  Lane,  "I  did  hope  that  we  might 
have  seen  just  one  little  submarine." 

It  is  hard  to  refuse  some  people  anything  — 
especially  American  girls  of  twenty-three.  Miss 
Lane's  wish  was  promptly  gratified.  A  few  hundred 


34  THE  LAST  MILLION 

yards  away,  right  in  the  middle  of  the  convoy, 
there  was  suddenly  protruded  from  the  unruffled 
surface  of  the  ocean  a  few  feet  of  something  grey, 
slender,  and  perpendicular  —  something  which, 
after  a  hurried  and  perfunctory  survey  of  the  situa- 
tion, retired  unobtrusively  whence  it  came.  But 
not  before  it  had  been  seen,  and  welcomed.  For  a 
brief  minute  shells  burst  around  it,  machine  guns 
pattered  imprecations  over  it,  bombs  descended 
upon  it  from  the  heavens  above,  and  depth- 
charges  detonated  in  the  waters  beneath.  The  con- 
voy altered  its  formation,  as  prudence  dictated. 
But  nothing  further  happened.  Calm  reigned  once 
more  upon  the  face  of  the  waters. 

''Some  little  surprise  for  him,  I  guess,"  said 
Cruttenden.  "Lying  on  the  bottom,  and  just  came 
up  for  a  look  around!  He  did  not  expect  to  poke  his 
periscope  into  this  hornet's  nest,  I  should  say.  I 
wonder  if  anything  hit  him.  I  guess  not:  he  was  too 
sHck.  But  you  had  your  thrill  right  enough.  Miss 

Lane!" 

Miss  Lane  sighed  rapturously. 

"The  censor  has  just  got  to  pass  that  when  I 
write  home,"  she  announced. 

Late  that  evening  we  made  our  port.  On  our  way 
in  we  passed  a  British  cruiser,  coaling.  The  band 
was  playing,  as  is  usual  during  coaling.  Our  tall  ship 
sUd  past  in  the  dusk,  undemonstratively,  almost 
surreptitiously.  One  of  the  tragedies  of  modern 
warfare  lies  in  its  anonymity.  You  may  not  display 
your  true  colours  or  advertise  your  presence  any- 


THE  DANGER  ZONE  35 

where  —  even  to  your  friends.  So  we  crept  past.  But 
a  sailor  can  read  ships  as  a  landsman  reads  books. 
The  cruiser's  band  stopped  suddenly,  right  in  the 
middle  of  a  tune,  and  in  two  minutes  the  cruiser's 
sides,  rigging,  and  tops  were  crowded  with  half- 
naked,  coal-grimed  humanity  yelUng  themselves 
hoarse  to  the  roaring  multitude  on  the  liner. 

"Listen!"  shouted  Boone  Cruttenden  into  his 
companion's  ear,  as  a  fresh  burst  of  sound  added 
itself  to  the  tumult;  "their  band  has  struck  up 
again.  Can  you  hear  it?" 

"No!  Yes,  I  do  now.  I  guess  it's  'God  Save  the 
King,'  or  one  of  those  tunes." 

But  Miss  Lane  was  wrong.  Suddenly  the  cheer- 
ing died  away  for  a  moment,  and  the  band  made 
itself  heard,  joyfully  and  triumphantly,  for  the 
first  time. 

And  the  tune  it  played  was  "Over  There." 

"Oh,  gee!"  said  Miss  Lane,  with  a  sob  in  her 
voice.  "Oh,  gee!" 


CHAPTER  FIVE 

TERRA  INCOGNITA 

We  have  not  yet  reached  France,  but  we  have  dis- 
covered England.  It  is  a  small  island,  and  the  visi- 
tor must  be  prepared  for  a  primitive  civilization 
—  for  instance,  The  Saturday  Evening  Post  costs  at 
least  fifteen  cents  —  but  it  offers  a  fruitful  and  in- 
teresting field  for  exploration. 

Our  debarkation  was  not  attended  by  any 
marked  popular  demonstration.  Some  of  us  were 
inclined  to  resent  the  omission  as  savouring  of  in- 
sular aloofness.  But  now  we  know  the  real  reason. 
We  are  not  supposed  to  he  here.  We  are  a  dead  se- 
cret. The  port  in  which  we  disembarked  has  no 
name.  Its  inhabitants  are  plunged  into  an  official 
trance.  Therefore  it  would  hardly  be  reasonable  to 
expect  the  insensible  population  of  an  anonymous 
city  to  proffer  a  civic  welcome  to  American  sol- 
diers who  are  officially  invisible  anyway. 

However,  by  a  fortunate  accident  at  the  mo- 
ment of  our  arrival,  a  band  of  musicians  happened 
to  be  discoursing  melody  on  the  wharf,  includ- 
ing such  airs  as  "The  Star-Spangled  Banner" 
and  "Dixie."  Moreover,  a  group  of  British  Staff 
Officers  groped  their  way  on  board  our  impercepti- 
ble vessel  and  greeted  us  cordially.  They  further- 
more presented  to  every  man  of  us  copies  of  a  letter 
written  by  King  George  with  his  own  hand,  bid- 


TERRA  INCOGNITA  37 

ding  us  welcome  to  his  realm  and  expressing  a  wish 
that  it  were  possible  for  him  to  shake  hands  with 
each  one  of  us  in  person.  Scores  of  copies  of  that  let- 
ter are  now  already  on  their  way  home  to  America 
—  the  first  souvenir  of  the  War. 

Thereafter  we  were  packed  into  a  child's  train, 
drawn  by  a  toy  engine,  and  conveyed  at  a  surpris- 
ing pace  through  a  country  of  green  fields,  cut  up 
into  checker-board  squares  by  hedges  and  narrow 
lanes,  populated  mainly  by  contemplative  cows 
and  dotted  with  red-roofed  farms  and  villages. 

Occasionally  we  passed  a  camp.  The  tents  were 
toylike  and  tidy,  like  the  country.  They  fitted  the 
landscape,  just  as  a  great  four-square  American 
Army  tent,  with  its  wooden  walls  and  dust-col- 
oured canvas  top,  fits  in  with  a  Texan  horizon.  In 
these  camps  were  men  in  khaki  —  some  drilling, 
some  performing  ablutions  in  buckets,  some  kick- 
ing a  football.  Mr.  Joe  McCarthy's  passion  for  be- 
ing waved  at  was  at  length  gratified. 

Occasionally  we  stopped  at  the  station  of  some 
town.  These  were  always  crowded,  as  were  the 
trains.  The  strange  little  compartments  in  which 
the  English  confine  themselves  when  travelling 
were  packed  with  humanity  —  some  of  it  standing 
up  and  clinging  to  the  luggage-rack  —  all  of  it  en- 
cumbered with  much  personal  property  in  the  shape 
of  bundles  and  babies.  Evidently  the  War  has  cut 
down  transportation.  At  either  end  of  these  trains 
a  seething  mob  contended,  with  surprising  good 
temper,  around  a  mountain  of  heavy  baggage  piled 
upon  the  platform  beside  the  express- van. 


38  THE  LAST  MILLION 

"Ain't  they  got  no  Red  Caps  in  this  country?" 
enquired  Mr.  McCarthy  in  disparaging  tones. 

''Their  Red  Caps  are  all  wearing  tin  helmets 
over  in  France,"  rephed  the  well-informed  Al 
Thompson.  "Everybody  here  up  to  fifty  is  drafted. 
Folks  have  to  tote  their  own  grips.  I  notice  quite  a 
few  women  porters  around.  I  guess  their  husbands 
are  in  France,  ahd  these  are  holding  down  their 
jobs  for  them." 

In  which  Al  spoke  no  more  than  the  truth. 
Meanwhile,  in  another  part  of  the  train,  our 
friend  Jim  Nichols,  Major  Powers,  and  one  Bond, 
a  stout,  comfortable  representative  of  the  Medical 
Service,  together  with  Boone  Cruttenden  —  the 
latter  somewhat  distrait,  for  Miss  Frances  Lane 
had  been  swept  away  with  the  other  ninety-and- 
nine,  by  a  different  train,  to  be  no  more  seen  — 
were  sharing  a  compartment  with  Captain  Norton 
and  a  British  Staff  Officer  — a  youthful  Major. 
The  Major's  name  was  Floyd;  he  had  materialized 
during  the  chaos  of  debarkation.  Norton  had  in- 
troduced hun  to  the  American  officers;  stately  sa- 
lutes had  been  exchanged;  gentlemen  had  stated  in 
a  constrained  manner  that  they  were  pleased  to 
know  one  another;  the  whole  party  had  crowded 
into  one  compartment,  and  the  train  had  started. 
For  nearly  an  hour  almost  total  silence  reigned. 
Americans  are  sensitive  folk,  and  Floyd's  melan- 
choly visage  and  paralyzing  monocle  fulfilled  our 
friends'  most  pessimistic  anticipations  of  the  Brit- 
ish Staff  Officer.  After  a  few  laboured  common- 
places the  conversation  lapsed  altogether,  and  the 


TERRA  INCOGNITA  39 

Americans  devoted  their  attention  to  the  flying 
landscape. 

Norton,  a  Httle  uncomfortable,  glanced  occa- 
sionally in  the  direction  of  his  brother  officer. 
Major  Floyd  sat  bolt  upright  in  his  seat,  his  gaze 
focussed  upon  infinity.  Norton,  who  was  a  man 
of  warm  heart  and  quick  temper,  was  conscious  of 
a  vague  feeling  of  resentment. 

'T  wonder,"  he  mused,  "why  an  image  like  this 
should  have  been  sent  as  conducting  officer.  No 
wonder  Americans  think  us  unsociable  and  rude. 
And  people  over  there  were  so  good  to  us  — " 

At  this  moment  Floyd  removed  his  monocle  and 
addressed  his  right-hand  neighbour  —  Boone  Crut- 
tenden. 

"And  now.  Lieutenant,  what  are  your  impres- 
sions of  our  country?" 

Boone  Cruttenden  smiled.  "You  have  not  given 
me  much  time  to  formulate  any,  Major,"  he  said, 
glancing  at  his  wrist- watch.  "Just  an  hour!" 

"That  is  fifty-nine  minutes  longer  than  the 
World  reporter  gave  me  when  I  landed  at  West 
Twenty-Third  Street  ten  years  ago,"  repUed  Floyd. 

"You  know  America? "  Four  homesick  Ameri- 
cans spoke  simultaneously. 

Floyd's  eyes  twinkled. 

"Some  of  it,"  he  said.  "I  was  with  the  General 
Electric  Company  at  Schenectady  for  three  years. 
After  that  I  worked  on  various  electrical-engineer- 
ing jobs  for  about  four  years;  I  got  as  far  west  as 
Cincinnati.  I'm  not  a  professional  warrior,  like 
Norton  there." 


40  THE  LAST  MILLION 

"Still,  you  have  seen  service  in  this  War?"  said 
Major  Powers. 

"Oh,  yes,  I  managed  to  get  home  from  America 
just  in  time  for  the  start  of  things." 

"Have  you  served  in  France,  or  on  one  of  your 
other  fronts?"  asked  Cruttenden.  "The  British 
Army  has  such  a  large  selection." 

"France  all  the  time  —  and  Belgium.  Most  of  us 
have  taken  a  course  of  the  Ypres  Salient." 

"I  guess  those  ribbons  the  Major  is  wearing 
would  give  us  details,  if  we  could  read  them,"  ob- 
served Jim  Nichols.  "What  do  they  stand  for, 
Major?" 

Floyd  laughed. 

"As  a  traditional  Englishman,"  he  said,  "I  sup- 
pose I  ought  to  hang  my  head  confusedly  and  de- 
cline to  answer.  But  I  have  spent  ten  years  outside 
my  own  country,  so  I  will  tell  you.  This  little  fellow 
wdth  the  rainbow  effect  you  probably  know:  Nor- 
ton has  it  too.  It  means  that  we  were  both  in  Fland- 
ers in  Nineteen  Fourteen.  The  khaki,  red,  and  blue 
is  the  Queen's  Medal  for  the  South  African  War. 
By  the  way.  Major  Powers,  I  notice  that  you  have 
the  Spanish  War  ribbon.  What  is  your  other  one  — 
the  yellow  and  blue?" 

"That  relates  to  our  Mexican  Border  troubles," 
replied  Powers.  "More  discomfort  than  danger 
getting  that.  What  is  that  third  ribbon  of  yours  — 
the  red  with  the  blue  edges?" 

"That?  Oh,  that  is  the  D.S.O." 

"What  does  that  stand  for?"  asked  Boone. 

"Well,  before  the  War  it  was  popularly  supposed 


TERRA  INCOGNITA  41 

to  stand  for  'Dam  Silly  Officer!'  Since  then,  how- 
ever, the  military  profession  has  risen  in  the  eyes  of 
the  world;  so  it  now  means  'Done  Something  or 
Other'!" 

"And  what  did  you  get  it  for?"  pursued  the  in- 
satiable Boone. 

Floyd  laughed. 

"Counting  jam-tins  at  the  Base!"  he  said. 

"I  suppose  it  was  while  counting  jam-tins  you 
lost  your  arm,"  suggested  the  quiet  voice  of  Major 
Bond. 

Floyd  laughed  again. 

"You  are  too  sharp  for  me,  Doctor,"  he  said.  "I 
plead  guilty.  My  left  arm  is  an  understudy.  The 
original  is  astray  somewhere  around  Beaumont 
Hamel.  I  have  had  to  stay  at  home  since  then.  But 
now  I  want  to  get  back  to  my  first  question.  Lieu- 
tenant. What  are  your  impressions  of  this  country 

—  your  first  impressions?  I  really  do  want  to  know. 
I  have  been  aching  to  ask  you  for  the  last  hour,  but 
I  felt  that  I  had  to  play  up  a  little  first.  Monocle  — 
vacant  stare,  and  all  that !  The  traditional  English- 
man, in  fact.  I  felt  you  were  entitled  to  meet  one," 
continued  this  eccentric  man;  "and  I  took  especial 
pains  to  give  you  a  good  impersonation,  because 
you  may  experience  some  difficulty  in  finding  an- 
other. The  fact  is,  the  traditional  Englishman  is 
getting  rare.  We  have  all  been  shaken  out  of  our- 
selves these  days.  After  the  War  he  may  come  back 

—  perhaps.  Perhaps  not."  He  sighed  gently.  "But 
at  present  I  am  here  to  supply  you  with  informa- 
tion about  the  customs  and  institutions  of  this 


42  THE  LAST  MILLION 

country.  I  am  detailed  for  the  job.  I  am  paid  for 
it.  Please  ask  me  questions,  somebody?" 

No  one  could  resist  this  solemn  appeal.  First  one 
query  was  proffered,  then  another.  Presently  the 
American  passion  for  getting  to  the  root  of  the 
matter  was  in  full  play. 

"Why  did  the  English  travel  in  closed  boxes? 
Why  were  the  locomotives  so  small,  and  why  did 
they  burn  soft  coal?  Why  were  there  so  many  over- 
head bridges  when  a  grade-crossing  would  suffice? 
What  would  be  the  wages  of  that  old  man  working 
in  that  field?  What  was  that  bright  yellow  crop 
growing  in  that  section?  Why  did  vehicles  in  a 
street  keep  to  the  left?  Was  there  any  organized 
system  of  irrigation,  that  the  country  was  all  so 
green?  Was  there  game  in  those  woods,  and  who 
had  the  right  to  hunt  it?" 

Norton,  a  professional  soldier  from  his  school 
days,  knew  nothing  of  many  of  these  things.  He 
was  also  a  tj^ical  Englishman,  and  had  been 
brought  up  to  accept  matters  as  he  found  them. 
But  he  was  the  son  of  an  English  country  squire, 
and  he  was  able  to  name  the  various  crops  — 
meadow-grass,  hay-grass,  wheat,  oats,  barley,  pota- 
toes, beans  —  whose  variegated  colours  impart  to 
an  English  landscape  its  curious  crazy-quilt  effect. 
He  was  well-versed,  too,  in  agricultural  economics 
and  the  hoary  traditions  of  the  feudal  system,  and 
discussed  voluminously,  as  an  Englishman  will 
when  started  upon  his  own  subject,  upon  farm- 
labourers'  wages,  the  rotation  of  crops,  and  the 
Ground  Game  Act. 


TERRA  INCOGNITA  43 

Floyd,  who  agreed  with  Dr.  Samuel  Johnson  in 
regarding  one  green  field  as  very  like  another  green 
field,  recked  nothing  of  these  things.  But  he  was  a 
mine  of  information  on  railroad  management.  To  a 
deeply  interested  audience  he  traced  the  origin  of 
the  standard  railway  gauge  of  the  world  back  to  an 
obscure  English  colliery  road  of  George  Stephen- 
son's days :  he  ascribed  the  multitude  of  overhead 
bridges  and  tightly  locked  level  crossings  to  the 
benevolent  fussiness  of  the  Board  of  Trade.  He 
even  knew  —  to  the  frank  amazement  of  Captain 
Norton  —  the  maximum  height  from  rail-level  to 
which  a  British  locomotive,  by  reason  of  the  afore- 
said bridges,  can  aspire  —  thus  accounting  for  the 
stunted  appearance  of  the  same  by  comparison 
with  its  American  brother,  which  in  an  atmosphere 
of  greater  freedom  is  permitted  to  soar  some  nine 
feet  higher.  Greatly  daring,  he  even  justified  the 
British  custom  of  keeping  to  the  left,  on  the  ground 
that  it  dated  back  to  the  days  when  men  rode  on 
horseback,  and  riders  and  postilions,  to  mount  or 
dismount,  must  perforce  draw  in  to  the  near  side  of 
the  road. 

An  American  is  forever  batthng  between  two 
instincts  —  native  appreciation  of  what  is  modern 
and  efiicient,  and  inherited  veneration  for  what  is 
ancient  and  inconvenient.  Common  sense  usually 
compels  him  to  favour  the  former;  but  he  is  never 
so  happy  as  when  he  can  conserve  or  justify  the 
latter. 

Major  Floyd  gratified  this  instinct.  He  carried 
his  hearers  back  to  the  days  of  stage-coaches.  He 


44  THE  LAST  MILLION 

told  of  the  opening  of  the  Stockton  and  Darhngton 
Railway;  of  Brunei  and  the  Broad  Gauge;  of  the 
railway  races  in  the  nineties,  when  the  Scottish  Ex- 
press ran  foiu-  hundred  miles  in  seven  hours.  Alto- 
gether, in  his  able  hands,  ''Romance  brought  up 
the  Nine  Fifteen." 

The  locomotive  gave  a  shriek,  and  the  train  be- 
gan to  slowdown.  Major  Powers  turned  from  the 
contemplation  of  a  tiny  English  town  nestling  in  a 
shallow  valley  a  mile  away.  With  its  red  roofs  and 
square  church  tower  set  against  a  background  of 
living  green,  it  looked  the  embodiment  of  unevent- 
ful drowsiness.  Certainly  a  little  imagination  was 
required  to  realize  that  under  nearly  every  one  of 
these  same  roofs  there  stood  at  least  one  empty 
chair  —  a  chair  that  might  or  might  not  be  occu- 
pied again  —  and  that  beneath  that  ancient  tower 
for  four  long  years,  week  by  week,  in  good  times 
and  in  bad,  women,  children,  and  old  men  had  con- 
gregated to  pray  that  those  whose  names  were  in- 
scribed upon  the  illuminated  scroll  in  the  church 
porch  —  squire's  son,  parson's  son,  farmer's  son, 
poacher's  son  —  might  in  God's  good  time  come 
home  again,  having  achieved  the  purpose  for 
which  they  had  set  out. 

Powers  possessed  the  requisite  imagination.  He 
had  been  reared  in  Kentucky  —  that  land  of  fair 
women  and  noble  horses.  This  toy  town,  which 
could  have  been  transported  bodily  into  his  native 
State  without  materially  affecting  either  the  land- 
scape or  the  census,  appealed  to  him,  as  small  chil- 
dren appeal  to  large  people. 


TERRA  INCOGNITA  45 

He  turned  to  Norton,  and  said  simply: 
"Captain,  I  have  never  been  outside  of  America 

before.  I  have  been  looking  over  this  little  island  of 

yours,  and  I  want  to  tell  you,  right  now,  that  I 

think  it  is  worth  fighting  for!" 

"Thanks  awfully,"  said  Norton  gravely,  and 

offered  an  unexpected  hand. 


CHAPTER  SIX 

SOCIAL  CUSTOMS  OF  THE  ISLANDERS 

We  are  now  at  a  rest-camp,  recharging  our  batter- 
ies after  the  fatigues  of  sea  travel  before  proceed- 
ing to  the  conquest  of  Germany. 

The  camp  is  situated  deep  in  rural  England.  At 
our  feet,  in  a  valley,  lies  an  ancient  city,  dominated 
by  a  mighty  cathedral.  It  was  once  a  walled  city, 
but  only  the  gates  remain  now  —  King's  Gate  and 
West  Gate.  At  the  top  of  the  High  Street  stands  a 
great  rough-hewn  statue  of  Alfred  the  Great  — 
dead  for  more  than  a  thousand  years.  He  makes  a 
fine  figure,  with  his  coat  of  mail  and  uplifted  broad- 
sword. Mr.  Eddie  Gillette,  among  whose  sterling 
virtues  sentiment  finds  no  place,  compares  him, 
not  unfavourably,  with  a  New  York  traffic  cop. 
Mr.  Joe  McCarthy,  still  dyspeptic  from  the  effects 
of  prolonged  ocean  travel,  describes  the  deceased 
monarch  as  a  tough  guy,  and  adds  further  that  in 
his  opinion  this  is  a  dead  town.  Al  Thompson,  of 
finer  clay,  inspects  the  statue  approvingly,  then 
passes  on  with  a  handful  of  interested  spectators 
to  the  cathedral,  whose  grey  walls  keep  eternal 
vigil  over  the  dust  of  Saxon,  Norman,  and  English 
dead  —  much  of  it  ancestral  American  dust. 

Elderly  gentlemen  in  maroon  dressing-gowns 
conduct  the  party  round,  and  in  piping  tones  in- 
troduce the  New  World  to  the  Old.  But  not  all 
Old.  In  one  nook  of  the  great  fabric,  guarded  by 
Old  Glory  itself,  gleaming  brightly  in  the  twilight, 


SOCIAL  CUSTOMS  47 

stands  an  Innovation  —  a  temporary  shrine  dedi- 
cated to  fallen  American  soldiers,  particularly 
those  who  have  died  in  English  hospitals  from 
wounds  received  in  France.  After  the  War  the  me- 
morial is  to  take  the  form  of  a  permanent  stained- 
glass  window.  At  present  in  England  people  are 
not  manufacturing  stained-glass  windows  —  only 
earning  them. 

The  countryside  is  full  of  camps  —  typically 
English  —  not  spacious  and  bewildering  such  as 
those  which  scared  the  mountaineer  from  Tennes- 
see, but  prim  and  tidy,  like  an  English  kitchen- 
garden.  The  white  conical  tents  are  set  out  in  close, 
level  rows,  like  cabbages.  The  Headquarters  tent 
and  the  Officers'  Mess  are  fenced  in  by  a  ring  of 
curious  boundary-stones,  set  a  few  feet  apart  and 
carefully  whitewashed.  The  district  is  full  of  Eng- 
lish soldiers.  We  have  never  seen  them  before,  and 
we  regard  them  with  interest.  We  note  with  grati- 
fication that  they  are  in  the  main  smaller  than  our- 
selves and  not  so  well  set-up,  though  sturdy  enough. 
Their  teeth  appear  to  require  attention:  gold  teeth 
have  not  yet  reached  this  country.  They  wear 
ragged  mustaches,  and  smoke  eternal  cigarettes. 
The  language  that  they  speak  is  entirely  incom- 
prehensible. 

Their  officers,  on  the  other  hand,  present  a  de- 
cidedly gay  and  frivolous  appearance.  They  look 
very  young;  they  wear  their  caps  at  a  rakish  angle; 
they  carry  canes.  They  are  secretly  regarded  by 
many  of  us  as  verging  upon  the  Clarence  class.  But 
the  old  stagers  of  our  camp  warn  us  not  to  form 


48  THE  LAST  MILLION 

our  judgments  too  hastily.  When  we  are  able  to 
read  the  biography  which  every  British  soldier 
carries  upon  his  sleeve  or  breast  —  scraps  of  rib- 
bon, service  chevrons,  wound  stripes,  and  the  like 

—  we  will  realize  that  things,  especially  in  Eng- 
land, are  not  always  what  they  seem. 

In  fact,  we  have  begim  to  realize  this  already. 
They  are  not  communicative,  the  people  we  meet 
here.  They  talk  little  of  the  War,  except  possibly 
to  belittle  their  own  conduct  thereof  or  disparage 
their  own  leaders;  but  we  are  dimly  conscious  that 
England  is  not  making  a  display  of  company  man- 
ners at  present.  Her  luxurious  private  parks  are 
scarred  by  horse-lines;  her  golf-courses  are  growing 
potatoes.  Her  great  country-houses,  badly  in 
need  of  paint  and  plaster,  are  flying  Red  Cross 
flags,  and  convalescent  soldiers  in  hospital  blue 
lounge  upon  balustraded  terraces  where  peacocks 
were  wont  to  strut.  Her  automobiles  appear  to 
have  enlisted  in  the  Army:  they  wear  a  business- 
like uniform  of  grey  paint,  and  are  driven  by  at- 
tractive young  women  in  khaki.  Every  one  ap- 
pears to  wear  a  uniform  of  some  kind  —  certainly 
no  one  wears  mourning  —  and  all  seem  too  busy  to 
worry  about  ceremony. 

When  we  arrived  in  this  town,  after  our  long 
cross-country  journey  from  our  landing  port,  we 
were  conscious  of  a  pleasant  feeling  of  anticipation. 
We  thought  of  the  folk  who  had  seen  us  off  at  home 

—  craroming  the  railway  stations,  cheering,  wav- 
ing, weeping  —  and  though  we  naturally  did  not 
expect  such  a  demonstration,  we  did  expect  some- 


SOCIAL  CUSTOMS  49 

thing.  Well,  it  did  not  turn  out  that  way.  We  ar- 
rived almost  furtively,  in  the  dead  of  night,  in  a 
station  where  one  gas-lamp  in  six  was  burning.  We 
were  warned  to  fall  in  quietly,  and  to  refrain  from 
noise  as  we  marched  through  the  town. 

''Not  a  very  overwhelming  display  of  cordiality, 
I'm  afraid,"  said  Major  Floyd;  "but  we  are  up 
against  official  secrets  again.  A  lady  called  Dora :  ^ 
you  will  become  well  acquainted  with  her.  It  is  not 
officially  known  to  any  one  —  except  the  Boche,  of 
course  —  that  this  is  an  American  Rest  Depot,  so 
we  are  concealing  the  fact  from  the  inhabitants. 
The  streets  are  a  bit  dark,  I'm  afraid;  but  we  are 
precious  short  of  coal  —  supplying  France  and 
Italy  as  well  as  ourselves  —  and  that  hits  our  light- 
ing arrangements  rather  hard.  Besides,  we  have 
the  Gothas  to  think  of.  Are  your  men  ready  to 
move  off.  Colonel?  Very  good:  I'll  lead  the  way. 
You  will  notice  our  solitary  attempt  at  the  glad- 
hand  business  just  outside  the  station." 

The  "solitary  attempt"  proved  to  be  a  dis- 
creetly illuminated  notice  spanning  the  street  on 
thefagade  of  an  arch.  It  said:  Welcome,  America! 

As  an  emotional  outburst  the  greeting  was  per- 
haps open  to  criticism  on  the  score  of  reticence; 
but  to  some  of  us,  who  knew  our  stiff,  angular,  in- 
articulate England  better  than  others,  there  was 
something  rather  moving  about  the  whole  idea. 

We  tramped  under  the  sign.  Those  who  had  the 
fancy  to  turn  and  look  up  at  the  other  face  of  the 
arch  found  another  notice :  God-speed  ! 
1  D.O.R.A.  Defence  of  the  Realm  Act. 


50  THE  LAST  MILLION 

"'God-speed'!  That's  a  bit  sudden,"  observed  a 
young  machine-gunner  to  a  grizzled  EngUsh  ser- 
geant who  was  acting  as  assistant  shepherd. 
''We've  hardly  arrived  yet." 

"That  ain't  meant  for  you,  my  lad,"  replied  the 
veteran.  "You  ain't  supposed  to  read  that  —  yet. 
That 's  for  another  lot  of  your  boys  what  are  start- 
ing off  to-night  for  France.  You'll  likely  meet  'em 
coming  down  the  'ill  as  you  goes  up." 

We  did.  And  when  the  event  took  place  — 
when  the  two  bands  of  tramping  American  exiles 
brushed  hands  for  a  moment  in  the  soft  summer 
darkness  of  a  strange  land  —  I  fear  there  was  some 
transgression  of  official  regulations  on  the  subject 
of  silent  and  secret  night  marching.  But,  after  all, 
there  are  limits  to  human  virtue. 

Yes,  everybody  here  appears  decidedly  busy  — 
especially  the  women.  That  shrewd  observer  of 
humanity,  Al  Thompson,  does  not  fail  to  remark 
upon  the  fact  in  a  letter  to  his  wife : 

You  get  kind  of  used  here  to  see  a  woman  do  all  the  chores 
that  we  all  considered  a  man's  job.  Driving  automobiles,  or 
cleaning  windows  high  up  in  the  air,  or  delivering  mails,  or 
tending  a  street-car,  or  despatching  trains.  They  have  boys, 
quite  little  fellers,  to  help  them  with  the  trains.  The  woman 
does  the  work  and  the  boy  blows  a  whistle,  like  what  you 
would  expect  of  a  boy.  I  seen  a  whole  bunch  of  girls  one  day 
outside  a  factory,  with  their  faces  and  hands  stained  yellow. 
That  was  picric  acid:  they  make  shells  with  it.  It  spoils 
their  looks  some,  but  they  should  worry.  They  just  waved 
their  hands  and  laughed  at  us  when  we  tried  to  josh  them. 
I  reckon  the  girls  at  home  are  all  doing  that  too  now;  but 
don't  you  go  for  to  stain  yourself  yellow,  my  dear. 


SOCIAL  CUSTOMS  51 

But  the  Islanders  are  not  too  busy  to  make  an 
attempt  to  entertain  us.  Some  of  these  attempts 
are  rather  formidable.  To  boys  Hke  Second  Lieu- 
tenant Sam  Richards  and  his  crony  Jim  Hollis,  in 
whose  pleasant  little  home  town  far  west  of  the 
Alleghenies  every  one  knows  every  one  else,  and 
young  men  and  maidens  usually  exchange  invita- 
tions over  the  telephone  (which  instrument  is 
practically  unknown  in  English  rural  districts), 
and  that  awful  shibboleth  of  Enghsh  society,  the 
language  of  the  third  person,  is  happily  extinct,  it 
is  a  little  alarming  to  find  upon  the  bulletin-board 
in  the  Mess  a  stiff  square  of  white  pasteboard  bear- 
ing the  legend: 


Col.  Adams  and  Officers 

LADY  WYVERN-GRYPHON 

AT  HOME 

SATURDAY,  JULY  6th,  3:30  P.M.  — 7:00 

AT 

LAWN  TENNIS         BROADOAK  PARK  r.s.v.p. 


Jim  Hollis  scrutinized  this  document  whimsi- 
cally. Then  he  turned  to  his  companion. 

"We  must  get  this  right,"  he  said.  ''Who  is 
Lady  Wy-Wy— ?" 

''Never  mind,"  said  Sam.  "Call  her  Lady  Whis- 
key-Syphon —  I  bet  the  name  is  n't  pronounced 
the  way  it's  spelled,  anyway." 


52  THE  LAST  MILLION 

"Well,"  continued  Jim,  ''who  is  Lady  Whiskey- 
Syphon,  and  what  does  this  'ad.'  mean?" 

"  It  means,"  replied  Sam,  whose  sense  of  humour 
was  always  stimulated  by  the  contemplation  of 
British  National  institutions,  "that  this  Lady  has 
been  away  and  now  she's  back  home." 
"For  three  and  a  half  hours?" 
"Yes.  These  people  have  a  bunch  of  homes,  like 
our  millionaires.  They  own  real-estate  lots  all  over 
the  country,  and  it  stands  to  reason  they  have  a 
home  in  each." 

"And  why  does  she  put  'Lawn  Tennis'  down 
there  in  that  corner?" 

"Because  she's  going  to  play  lawn  tennis,  from 
three-thirty  to  seven.  That's  easy." 

"But  what  does  she  want  to  tell  us  for?  We  are 
nothing  in  her  young  life." 

"She  wants  us  to  go  play  with  her,"  explained 
Sam  gently.  "Nobody  can  play  lawn  tennis  by 
themselves.  She  wants  you,  boy." 

"Where  does  it  say  that?"  enquired  the  incredu- 
lous James. 

"It  doesn't  say  it.  The  English  don't  say  it. 
It  would  sound  too  eager.  They  just  mention 
the  event  casually,  and  if  you  want  to  go  you 


can." 


"But  I  don't  want  to  go." 
"Well,  write  and  say  so." 
"Why?  It  doesn't  tell  me  to  do  that  on  the 

card." 

"Doesn't  it?  Jim  Hollis,  haven't  you  got  any 
sisters  to  tell  you  what  things  mean?  Look  at  that 


SOCIAL  CUSTOMS  53 

R.S.V.P.  down  there!  That's  the  reference-num- 
ber of  the  file,  and  you  quote  it  in  replying." 

Jim  paled. 

''Listen,  how  do  you  address  anybody  like 
that?  "  he  enquired,  despairingly. 

Sam's  eyes  twinkled. 

"Ask  the  Adjutant,"  he  advised. 

Reference  to  that  overworked  official  elicited 
the  information  that  the  invitation  had  abeady 
been  accepted  by  the  Colonel  on  behalf  of  the 
Mess,  and  that  if  the  regiment  were  still  in  Eng- 
land on  July  the  sixth  two  or  three  officers  would 
be  detailed  to  accompany  him  to  Broadoak  Park. 

"Me  for  the  backwoods  on  the  sixth!"  mur- 
mured Master  Hollis  fervently. 

But  the  very  next  day,  as  Jim  and  Sam  were 
toiling  up  the  hill  to  the  camp  after  inspecting  the 
cathedral,  they  were  overtaken  by  an  elderly  auto- 
mobile. It  drew  up  beside  them,  and  a  rather  gruff 
voice  enquired: 

"Won't  you  get  in  and  let  me  drive  you  up  to 
the  camp?  I  am  going  that  way,  anyhow." 

They  accepted  gratefully  —  it  was  a  blazing  hot 
day  —  and  presently  found  themselves  chatting 
composedly,  with  the  American's  natural  instinct 
for  easy  conversation,  with  a  high-nosed,  deep- 
voiced  old  lady  in  black. 

"One  ought  to  be  thankful  to  be  able  to  drive 
anywhere  these  days,"  remarked  their  hostess  — 
"let  alone  give  any  one  a  lift.  Do  you  know  how 
much  petrol  the  Controller  allows  me?  Ten  gallons 
a  month !  And  I  live  five  miles  from  a  railway  sta- 


54  THE  LAST  MILLION 

tion!  It  used  to  be  six  gallons,  but  I  get  a  little 
more  now  because  I  am  taking  in  more  patients. 
My  house  is  a  hospital,  you  know." 

They  did  not  know;  but  it  did  not  seem  to  mat- 
ter, for  the  old  lady  continued: 

"I  hope  you  are  coming  to  my  tennis-party  on 
the  sixth.  You  will  meet  some  charming  girls  — 
mostly  V.A.D.'s.  You  got  a  card,  I  suppose?" 

Jim,  shrinking  back  into  the  cushions,  pressed 
uneasily  upon  the  toe  of  his  brother  officer.  But 
Lady  Wyvern-Gryphon  swept  on: 

'T  reahzed  afterwards  how  stupid  I  had  been  to 
send  out  the  cards  at  all.  It  would  have  been  much 
simpler  and  more  considerate  to  do  what  I  am  do- 
ing now  —  pay  an  informal  call  on  your  Colonel 
and  ask  him  to  bring  along  any  officers  who  might 
have  nothing  better  to  do  on  the  day,  instead  of 
bothering  busy  men  to  answer  silly  written  invita- 
tions. But  one  can  never  do  a  thing  except  in  the 
way  one  has  done  it  for  forty  years  —  even  with  a 
War  on.  You  must  have  thought  me  very  tire- 
some." (She  pronounced  it  "tarsome.")  ''What 
quaint  experiences  you  must  be  having  among 
us!" 

''We  are  having  very  pleasant  experiences," 
said  Jim. 

"That's  nice  of  you.  You  said  it  much  more 
promptly  than  an  Englishman  would  have  done, 
too.  Do  you  know,"  continued  this  most  informal 
grande  dame,  rounding  suddenly  upon  the  speaker, 
"that  when  you  smile  you  are  amazingly  Uke  my 
second  son?" 


SOCIAL  CUSTOMS  55 

"He  is  in  France,  I  suppose?"  hazarded  Jim. 

**  Yes  —  he  is  in  France.  And  —  he  is  not  com- 
ing back  to  me,  I  fear."  The  old  lady's  voice  was  as 
gruff  as  ever.  *Tt  happened  at  Le  Gateau,  nearly 
four  years  ago.  He  was  mentioned  in  Despatches, 
though.  One  will  always  feel  glad  of  that." 

"And  proud,"  added  Sam  Richards. 

"Oh,  yes  —  proud  too.  Pride  is  the  greatest 
boon  bestowed  on  mothers  in  war-time.  I  don't 
know  why  the  clergy  are  always  preaching  against 
it.  Before  this  War  I  possessed  four  sons,  and  a  cer- 
tain modicum  of  pride.  Now  I  have  only  one  son, 
but  I  have  four  times  as  much  pride.  One  finds  it 
very  sustaining.  Have  you  boys  mothers?" 

Both  boys  nodded  assent. 

"Well,  if  you  will  give  me  their  addresses  I 
will  write  to  them  both,  and  say  I  have  seen 
you.  Mothers  like  first-hand  information,  you 
know." 

Visiting-cards  were  produced  shyly,  and  disap- 
peared into  a  little  black  bag. 

"I  have  never  been  in  America,"  continued 
Lady  Wyvern-Gryphon.  "But  one  of  my  daugh- 
ters-in-law is  American.  She  came  from  Philadel- 
phia. Is  that  anywhere  near  your  homes?  You 
know  it,  at  any  rate." 

They  confessed  that  they  lived  some  fifteen 
hundred  miles  from  Philadelphia. 

"Indeed!"  remarked  her  ladyship,  not  at  all 
perturbed.  "That  is  interesting.  We  have  no  con- 
ception of  distance  in  this  country.  Now  tell  me, 
how  does  an  Anaerican  country  town  differ  from  a 


56  THE  LAST  MILLION 

tovm  like  this?  "\Miat  does  a  street  look  like,  com- 
pared with  one  of  ours?" 

"Wider,  and  straighter,"  said  Jim. 

''With  maple  trees  growing  along,"  added  Sam. 

''The  houses  ai-e  wooden,"  continued  Jim, 
warming  up  —  "painted  white,  with  a  piazza,  and 
wii'e  doors  to  keep  the  flies  out  in  — " 

"And  no  fences  between  the  houses,"  continued 
Sam,  almost  shouting.  "And  none  in  front.  You 
just  step  right  do\Mi  on  the  street." 

"And  in  simmier-time,"  interrupted  Jim,  with 
eyes  closed  rapturously,  "when  the  sun  strikes 
down  thi'ough  the  maple  trees,  an'  —  oh,  gee,  I 
wish  I  was  there  now!" 

After  that  om*  two  heutenants  took  entire 
charge  of  the  conversation.  They  conducted  Lady 
Wyvern-GrA-phon,  street  by  street,  block  by  block, 
through  their  home  towm.  They  described  the  rail- 
road station,  where  the  gi*eat  trunk  track  i-uns 
through  and  the  mail  trains  pause  for  brief  refresh- 
ment on  their  long  journey  to  the  Pacific  Coast. 
They  described  the  Pullman  cars;  the  porters  with. 
their  white  jackets  and  black  faces;  they  related, 
with  affectionate  relish,  one  or  two  standard  anec- 
dotes aimed  at  that  common  target  of  American 
sarcasm,  the  upper  berth.  They  described  the 
street-car  sj'stem,  and  explained  carefully  that  to 
get  from  Sam's  house  to  Jim's  you  had  to  change 
cars  at  the  corner  of  M  Street  and  Twenty- 
first  — 

"There's  a  drug-store  on  the  corner,"  mentioned 
Jim.  (AMiether  as  a  topographical  pointer  or  in 


SOCIAL  CUSTOMS  57 

wistful  reference  to  far-distant  ice-cream  soda,  is 
not  known.) 

They  passed  on  to  the  million-dollar  Insm*ance 
Building  downtown;  the  State  University  on  the 
hill  above;  the  Country  Club,  with  its  summer 
games  and  winter  dances.  Finally,  being  American 
and  not  English,  they  spoke  frankly,  naturally, 
and  appreciatively  of  their  womenkind.  Alto- 
gether, being  but  boys,  and  homesick  boys  at 
that,  they  spoke  all  that  was  in  their  hearts,  and 
incidentally  conveyed  considerable  warmth  to  the 
heart  of  a  rather  formidable,  extremely  lonely,  old 
lady. 

They  saluted  politely  when  the  time  came  to 
part,  and  informed  their  new  friend  that  they  were 
very  pleased  to  have  known  her. 

''And  I  am  very  pleased  to  have  known  you!" 
replied  her  ladyship,  with  a  heartiness  which  would 
have  surprised  some  of  her  friends.  ''Don't  bother 
about  that  tennis  invitation.  You  probably  won't 
be  here,  anyway,  to  judge  from  the  speed  with 
which  you  all  scuttle  through  this  country.  Come 
to  lunch  to-morrow  instead,  and  tell  me  more." 

They  went. 


CHAPTER  SEVEN 

THREE  MUSKETEERS  IN  LONDON 

Our  stay  in  England  has  been  prolonged  beyond 
the  usual  time,  chiefly  because  that  impartial  foe  of 
the  just  and  the  unjust,  the  Spanish  Influenza,  has 
opened  a  campaign  against  us,  and  it  is  manifestly 
foolish  to  attack  Germany  before  you  have  settled 
accounts  with  Spain. 

Pending  the  time  when  our  invalids  shall  be 
convalescent,  we  have  had  some  interesting  ex- 
periences. We  have  explored  the  countryside, 
and  studied  and  analyzed  the  structure  of  insular 
society.  We  have  consorted  with  Barons,  Squires, 
and  Knights  of  the  Shire;  with  Bishops,  Priests, 
and  Deacons;  with  Waacs,  Wrens,  and  V.A.D.'s; 
with  Farmers,  Hedgers,  and  Land  Girls;  with 
Mayors  and  Corporations.  They  are  all  interest- 
ing; most  of  them  are  quite  human;  and  all,  once 
you  know  them,  are  extremely  friendly  and  anxious 
to  entertain  us. 

For  instance,  there  was  the  Fourth  of  July,  ofR- 
cially  celebrated  in  London.  British  Official  —  not 
American.  The  Americans  are  a  patriotic  people; 
but  it  certainly  had  not  occurred  to  us,  sojourning 
in  Great  Britain,  to  undertake,  this  year  of  all 
years,  any  ostentatious  celebration  of  the  founda- 
tion of  our  national  liberties. 

But  John  Bull  would  have  none  of  this  false  deli- 
cacy. 


THREE  MUSKETEERS  59 

"My  dear  fellow,"  he  said  in  effect,  "of  course 
you  must  celebrate  the  Fourth  of  July.  We  know  it 
is  one  of  your  greatest  national  festivals.  We  will 
help  you.  We  will  put  up  flags,  arrange  a  demon- 
stration, and  devise  special  features  for  the  day. 
Let  me  see  —  you  usually  have  fireworks,  don't 
you?  Sorry!  I'm  afraid  we  can't  quite  manage  fire- 
works this  year.  You  see,  they  might  be  miscon- 
strued into  an  air-raid  warning.  But  anything  else 
—  bands,  processions,  baseball?  My  boy,  you  shall 
have  them  all!  What  else?  Won't  you  require 
pumpkin-pie,  or  cranberry  sauce,  or  something  of 
that  kind?  Oh  —  that 's  Thanksgiving  ?  I  beg  your 
pardon.  Stupid  of  me  to  mix  'em.  Anyway,  you 
must  have  a  jolly  good  time.  We  should  never  for- 
give ourselves  if  we  did  n't  give  you  a  chance  to 
celebrate  an  occasion  like  that.  I  know  how  we 
should  feel  if  we  had  to  cut  out  Christmas,  old 
man!" 

We  forbore  to  explain  that  Christmas  is  also,  to  a 
certain  extent,  a  recognized  festival  in  the  United 
States,  and  merely  accepted  John  Bull's  invitation 
in  the  spirit  in  which  it  was  offered  —  that  is  to 
say,  with  great  heartiness  but  some  vagueness  as 
to  the  probable  course  of  events. 

However,  everything  worked  out  right  on  the 
day.  On  the  Fourth  of  July,  nineteen  eighteen^ 
London  was  turned  over  to  the  Americans.  In  the 
morning,  parties  of  American  soldiers  and  sailors 
proceeded  to  explore  the  town.  They  enquired  po- 
htely  of  passers-by  for  the  Tower  of  London;  the 
Old  Curiosity  Shop;  the  Houses  of  Parliament, 


60  THE  LAST  MILLION 

Westminster  Abbey;  Buckingham  Palace.  The 
passers-by,  though  cordially  disposed,  did  not  al- 
ways know  where  these  places  were.  The  Londoner 
takes  his  national  monuments,  like  the  British 
Constitution  and  the  British  Navy,  for  granted, 
and  is  seldom  concerned  with  the  Why  and  Where- 
fore thereof.  However,  we  succeeded  in  discover- 
ing most  of  these  places  for  ourselves,  and  were 
gratified  to  observe  that  Old  Glory  was  amicably 
sharing  a  flagpole  over  the  Palace  of  Westminster 
with  the  Union  Jack. 

By  high  noon  most  of  us  had  squeezed  ourselves 
into  Central  Hall,  Westminster,  where  all  the 
Americans  in  London  seemed  to  be  gathered,  to- 
gether with  a  goodly  percentage  of  the  native  ele- 
ment. A  sohd  wedge  of  convalescent  soldiers  in 
hospital  blue  supplied  the  necessary  reminder  of 
the  Thing  which  had  brought  us  together.  The 
speakers  included  a  British  ex-Ambassador,  vener- 
ated on  both  sides  of  the  Atlantic,  a  British  Cabinet 
Minister,  an  American  Admiral,  and  an  Ameri- 
can General.  Altogether,  an  affair  to  write  home 
about. 

Thereafter,  refreshment,  at  the  Eagle  Hut,  the 
Beaver  Hut,  Washington  Inn,  and  other  recently 
opened  hospitality  centres.  At  one  of  these  Ikey 
Zingbaum  succeeded  during  the  rush  of  business 
in  cashing  a  Confederate  twenty-dollar  bill,  which 
had  been  '^ wished  on"  him  one  dark  night  some 
years  previously,  and  which  he  had  carried  in  his 
pocket,  faint  yet  pursuing,  ever  since.  He  got  four 
pounds  sterling  for  it  —  a  rate  of  interest  more 


THREE  MUSKETEERS  61 

indicative  of  International  amity  than  financial 
condition. 

Al  Thompson,  Ed  Gillette,  and  that  captious 
critic  Joe  McCarthy  (not  yet  entirely  recovered 
from  dyspepsia  incurred  upon  his  maiden  ocean 
voyage),  pushed  their  way  out  of  the  crowded  Hall 
into  the  blazing  July  sunshine,  and  enquired  of  one 
another  simultaneously : 

''Where  do  we  eat?" 

In  a  spirit  of  appropriate  independence  they 
decided  to  elude  the  special  an-angements  made 
for  their  entertainment  and  forage  for  themselves. 
From  the  moment  of  their  embarkation  from  their 
native  land  their  daily  diet  had  been  selected  and 
provided  by  a  paternal  but  unimaginative  Depart- 
ment of  State,  and  their  stomachs  cried  out  for 
something  unusual,  unexpected,  and,  if  possible, 
unwholesome.  But  London  has  an  area  of  seven 
hundred  and  fifty  square  miles.  This  offers  an  em- 
barrassing choice  of  places  of  refreshment.  They 
swung  on  their  heels  undecided. 

"I  guess  we  better  ask  some  guy,"  suggested  Ed 
Gillette. 

The  motion  was  seconded  by  Al  Thompson. 

''There's  a  Jock,"  he  said.  "Let's  go  ask  him." 

They  approached  their  quarry  —  a  squat  figure 
in  a  kilt,  with  a  round  and  overheated  counte- 
nance beaming  hke  a  vermilion  haggis  under  a  vo- 
luminous khaki  bonnet  —  and  addressing  him  as 
"friend,"  enquired: 

"Where  do  folks  eat  around  here?" 

The  Scot  smiled  affably. 


62  THE  LAST  MILLION 

"I'm  no  varra  weel  acquent  with  this  toon,"  he 
admitted.  'Tf  it  was  Airdrie,  now,  or  Coatbridge! 
I'm  awa'  there  to-night.  I'm  just  on  leave,  like 
yourselves.  But  I  doot  we'll  no  be  goin'  far  wrong 
if  we  keep  along  toward  The  Strand.  Will  I  come 
with  you?" 

''Sure!"  repHed  Ed  Gillette  heartily. 

''This  is  on  us,"  Al  Thompson  hastened  to  add. 

The  Scotsman  led  the  way.  Whether  he  had 
grasped  the  implied  offer  of  hospitality  is  doubtful. 
However,  that  hardened  cynic  Joe  McCarthy 
cherished  no  illusions  on  the  subject.  He  sniffed 
contemptuously . 

Their  walk  towards  The  Strand  —  it  is  to  be 
feared  that  their  guide's  sense  of  direction  was 
once  or  twice  at  fault  —  gave  them  further  oppor- 
tunities of  studying  the  habits  and  customs  of  the 
strange  race  upon  whom  they  had  descended.  In 
one  quiet  street  —  there  are  many  such  in  London 
these  days,  for  traffic  is  down  to  a  minimum  — 
they  beheld  a  middle-aged  lady  hail  a  crawling 
taxieab.  The  driver  of  the  vehicle  took  not  the 
slightest  notice,  but  slid  upon  his  way. 

"There's  jest  twa-three  o'  they  taxis  nowadays 
where  formerly  there  was  a  hunnerd  in  a  street," 
explained  that  man-about-town,  Private  Andrew 
Drummond.  "Consequently,  they  can  pick  and 
choose.  They'll  no  tak'  a  body  that  looks  ower 
carefu'  of  their  money.  There 's  another  yin! 
He  '11  give  the  auld  wife  the  go-bye  too,  I  'm  think- 
ing. She  doesna  look  like  yin  o'  the  extravagant 
soort." 


THREE  MUSKETEERS  63 

He  was  right.  A  second  taxi  sauntered  past  the 
gesticulating  lady.  This  time  the  driver,  after  a 
single  fleeting  glance,  condescended  to  flip  his 
right  hand  in  the  air,  in  a  gesture  which  may  have 
been  intended  to  indicate  that  he  had  particular 
business  elsewhere,  but  more  probably  expressed 
his  contempt  for  the  pedestrian  world  in  general. 

The  gesture  was  observed  by  a  passing  citizen 
—  an  elderly  gentleman  with  white  whiskers  and 
spats  —  w^ho,  at  first  appropriating  it  to  himself, 
stopped  and  glared  at  the  offender.  Then  noting 
beauty  in  distress  upon  the  sidewalk,  he  assailed 
the  taxi  with  indignant  cries. 

"Hi,  there!  Taxi!  Stop!  Stop,  there!  Don't  you 
see  the  lady  hailing  you?" 

The  taxi-driver  perfectly  impassive,  pressed  his 
accelerator. 

"Stop,  confound  you ! "  yelled  the  old  gentleman, 
waving  his  umbrella.  "Stop,  you  blackguard! 
Don't  you  hear  — " 

This  time  the  taxi-driver  replied  with  a  gesture 
quite  unmistakable,  and  disappeared  from  sight 
round  the  corner. 

The  old  gentleman  turned  apologetically  to  his 
Ariadne. 

"Intolerable!  Monstrous!"  he  announced.  "If 
you  will  allow  me,  madam,  I  will  stay  and  secure 
the  next  taxi  for  you,  or  give  the  man  in  charge." 

"Boys,"  murmured  the  dreamy  voice  of  that 
bonny  fighter,  Ed  Gillette,  "I  guess  we'll  stay  an' 
see  this  through.  We're  nootral,  of  course,  but 
maybe  we  can  hand  the  taxi-driver  a  Note!" 


64  THE  LAST  MILLION 

Without  further  pressure  our  four  friends  an- 
chored in  a  favourable  position  on  the  opposite 
side  of  the  sunny  street,  and  awaited  developments. 
One  or  two  vehicles  sped  through,  but  they  were 
either  military  automobiles  or  taxis  carrying 
passengers.  Once  or  twice  a  tradesman's  delivery- 
van  passed  by,  rendered  top-heavy  in  appearance 
by  a  bloated  gas-bag  billowing  upon  the  roof.  But 
nothing  else. 

'"Nother  dead  town!"  mm-mured  Joe  Mc- 
Carthy, not  without  satisfaction. 

As  he  spoke,  another  taxi,  with  flag  up,  swung 
round  the  corner.  The  old  gentleman,  taking  up  a 
frontal  position  in  the  middle  of  the  street,  waved 
his  umbrella.  The  taxi,  with  a  swerve  that  would 
have  done  credit  to  a  destroyer  avoiding  a  mine, 
eluded  him,  and  resumed  its  normal  course.  This 
manoeuvre  accomplished,  it  slackened  speed  again. 

But  the  British  are  a  tenacious  race.  The  elderly 
champion  of  the  fair  turned  and  ran  with  surprising 
swiftness  after  the  receding  vehicle.  He  overtook 
it.  He  took  a  flying  leap  upon  the  footboard  beside 
the  driver,  and  grasping  that  astonished  malefactor 
by  the  collar  with  one  hand  laid  hold  of  the  side 
brake  with  the  other.  Employing  the  driver's 
neck  as  fulcrum,  he  pulled  the  lever  with  all  his 
strength  and  jammed  the  brakes  on  hard.  His 
baffled  victim  having  automatically  thrown  open 
the  throttle  of  the  engine,  the  whirring  back 
wheels,  caught  in  the  full  embrace  of  the  brake, 
skidded  violently;  the  cab  described  a  semicircle, 
and  ran  to  a  full  stop  on  the  sidewalk  with  its  radi- 


THREE  MUSKETEERS  65 

ator  (which  had  narrowly  missed  Joe  McCarthy) 
pressed  affectionately  against  some  one's  area 
raihngs. 

After  this  all  concerned  got  into  action  with 
as  little  delay  as  possible.  The  old  gentleman, 
descending  from  his  perch,  opened  upon  his 
opponent  at  a  range  of  about  three  feet.  Such 
phrases  as  "Ruffian!"  ''Bandit!"  ''Thug!"  "Ya- 
hoo!" "Police!"  "War  on,  too!"  flew  from  him 
like  hail.  The  driver,  though  obviously  rattled  by 
the  complete  unexpectedness  of  the  attack,  and 
further  hampered  by  having  swallowed  the  glow- 
ing stub  of  a  cigarette,  reacted  (as  they  say  in  the 
official  communique)  with  creditable  promptness. 

"Call  yourself  a  gentleman?  "  he  coughed.  "'Ard- 
workin' man  like  me !  .  .  .  Over  milingtary  age!  .  .  . 
Carryin'  on  as  well  as  I  can  till  the  boys  comes 
'ome!  .  .  .  Disgrace,  that's  what  you  are!  .  .  .  Got 
a  job  in  the  War  Office,  I'll  lay  a  tanner!  ...  I'll 
summons  you  for  assault  and  damagin'  my  keb ! 
.  .  .  The  first  copper  I  sees  ..." 

And  so  on.  Meanwhile  the  lady  in  the  case, 
much  to  her  owm  surprise,  found  herself  propelled 
by  four  pairs  of  willing  hands  into  the  cab.  This 
done,  the  door  was  shut  upon  her,  and  a  soothing 
Scots-American  chorus  assured  her  through  the 
window-glass  that  the  entire  matter  would  straight- 
way be  adjusted.  ("Fixed"  was  the  exact  term 
employed.) 

But  now  a  new  figure  added  itself  to  the  tab- 
leau —  a  slightly  nervous  individual  in  blue,  with 
silver  buttons  and  flat  peaked  cap.  He  coughed 


66  THE  LAST  MILLION 

in  a  deprecating  fashion,  and  produced  a  note- 
book. 

''That  a  cop?"  enquired  Ed  Gillette  of  the 
Scot. 

''No  jist  exactly.  He's  a  'Special.'  I  doot  he'll 
no  be  a  match  for  the  taxi-man." 

But  the  Special  Constable,  though  his  lack  of 
stolidity  betrayed  the  amateur,  had  been  well- 
drilled  in  his  part. 

"Now,  then,  now,  then,"  he  demanded  sternly, 
"what's  all  this?  Driver,  what  is  your  cab  doing 
up  against  these  railings?  You  are  causing  an 
obstruction." 

These  questions  were  promptly  answered  by 
the  old  gentleman  in  a  sustained  passage,  sup- 
ported by  a  soprano  obbligato  from  the  interior  of 
the  taxi.  The  "Special"  listened  judicially,  and 
finally  held  up  his  hand. 

"That'll  do,"  he  intimated,  and  turned  to  the 
taxi-driver. 

"What  have  you  got  to  say?" 

The  taxi-driver,  having  by  this  time  cleared  his 
larynx  of  cigarette-ash,  shrugged  his  shoulders. 

"Me?  Oh,  nothink!  What  I  say  don't  matter. 
I'm  a  poor  man:  I  don't  count  for  any  think.  That 
old  garrotter  only  tried  to  murder  me  —  that 's 
all!  Flew  at  me,  he  did,  out  of  the  middle  of  the 
road  like  a  laughin'  hyena,  and  nearly  broke  my 
neck,  besides  wreckin'  my  keb.  But  of  course  I 
don't  matter.  Let  'im  'ave  it  'is  own  way.  One  law 
for  the  rich,  and  another  — " 

Do  you  charge  this  gentleman  with  assault?" 


iC 


THREE  MUSKETEERS  67 

interpolated  the  Special,  who  had  evidently  come 
to  the  conclusion  that  it  was  time  to  get  down 
to  the  rigid  official  formula  provided  for  such 
occasions  as  this. 

''Charge  'im?  And  waste  'alf  a  workin'  day  at 
a  blinkin'  police  court,  waitin'  for  the  case  to  come 
on?  Not  me!"  replied  the  taxi-man,  with  evident 
sincerity.  "Oh,  no,  Vm  only  a  pore — " 

"Constable,  will  you  please  tell  this  man  to  drive 
me  to  Half-moon  Street?"  demanded  a  high- 
pitched  voice  from  the  interior  of  the  cab. 

'T  have  no  power  to  compel  him  to  drive  you 
anywhere,  madam,"  replied  the  Special,  with 
majestic  humility. 

"Well,  what  powers  have  you  got?"  shouted  the 
old  gentleman. 

"At  your  request,  sir,  I  can  take  his  name  and 
number,  and  you  can  charge  him  with  declining 
to  ply  for  hire  when  called  upon  to  do  so,"  chanted 
the  limb  of  the  Law.  "Do  you  wish  to  charge 
him?" 

"Wish?"  shrieked  the  old  gentleman.  "Of 
course  I  wish!  I  mean"  —  as  he  met  the  cold  and 
steady  eye  of  the  Special  —  "I  shall  be  obliged  if 
you  will  charge  this  man,  officer." 

"Very  good,"  was  the  gracious  reply.  "Now 
I  can  ad."  The  Special  turned  to  the  cabman,  with 
pencil  poised.  "Your  name?" 

"Most  certainly  you  shell  'ave  my  name!" 
retorted  the  other,  with  the  air  of  a  master- 
tactician  who  at  last  sees  his  opponent  walk  into 
a   long-prepared   trap.    "And  my   number,    too! 


68  THE  LAST  MILLION 

And  you'll  oblige  me,  Constable,  by  takin'  his 
name  and  address  as  well.  I  don't  intend  for  to  — " 

"Your  name?"  suggested  the  Special  unfeel- 
ingly. 

"Henery  Mosscockle,  Number  Five-oh-seven- 
oh— " 

Details  followed,  all  duly  noted.  Then  came 
the  turn  of  the  old  gentleman.  He  proffered  a 
visiting-card,  and  gave  another  to  the  cabman, 
who  apologized  for  being  unable  to  reciprocate, 
on  the  ground  that  he  had  left  his  card-case 
on  the  Victrola  in  his  drawing-room.  Our  Three 
Musketeers,  together  with  their  D'Artagnan, 
were  moved  to  audible  chuckles.  The  old  gentle- 
man, aware  of  their  presence  for  the  first  time, 
swung  round  and  addressed  them. 

"American  soldiers!"  he  exclaimed.  "Good- 
morning,  gentlemen.  I  am  sorry  that  you  should 
have  witnessed  such  a  poor  specimen  of  British 
patriotism.  None  of  that  sort  in  your  country, 
I'll  be  bound!" 

Our  friends  saluted  politely,  and  cast  about  for 
an  answer  which  should  be  both  candid  and  equally 
agreeable  to  all  parties  —  not,  when  you  come  to 
think  of  it,  a  particularly  easy  task.  But  it  was 
that  ill-used  individual,  the  taxi-driver,  who 
replied.  He  thrust  a  bristling  chin  towards  the 
old  gentleman. 

"Patriotism?"  he  barked.  "As  man  to  man,  tell 
me  —  'ow  old  are  you?  " 

"That,"  snapped  the  old  gentleman,  "is  my 
business!" 


THREE  MUSKETEERS  69 


(( ' 


Well,"  announced  the  taxi-driver,  with  the 
air  of  a  man  who  has  been  awarded  a  walk-over, 
"I'm  fifty-seven.  Any  sons?" 

"Two." 

"Two?  Well,  I  got  two  too  — one  in  the  East 
Surreys  and  the  other  in  the  Tanks.  ('E  was  a 
machine-gunner  in  the  first  place.)  Both  bin  in 
the  War  four  years.  Both  bin  wounded.  What  are 
3^ours  in?  The  Circumloosion  Office,  or  the  Con- 
chies' Battahon?"  ' 

"One  is  in  the  Coldstream  Guards.  The  other 
was  a  Gunner,  but  he  was  killed." 

The  cabman  became  human  at  once. 

"I'm  sorry  for  that  —  sir!  May  I  ask  where?" 

"First  Battle  of  Ypres." 

"Epray?  That  was  where  our  Bert  stopped  his 
first  one." 

"I  have  a  son  too,"  interpolated  the  Special 
eagerly  —  "in  the  — " 

But  no  one  took  any  notice  of  him.  The  cab- 
man and  the  old  gentleman  had  entirely  forgotten 
the  existence  of  the  rest  of  the  party. 

"Not  badly  wounded,  I  hope?" 

"Nothing  to  signify  —  a  couple  of  machine- 
gun  bullets  in  the  forearm.  The  second  time  was 
worser.  That  was  at  a  place  somewhere  in  the 
'Indenburg  line,  spring  of  last  year.  'En-in-'EU, 
or  some  such  name.  Bert  copped  a  sweet  one  that 
time  —  bit  o'  shell-splinter  as  big  as  me  'and.  It 
was  nearly  a  year  before  'e  was  fit  to  go  back. 
You  see — " 

^  "Conchies,"  being  interpreted,  means  "Conscientious  Ob- 
jectors." 


70  THE  LAST  MILLION 

But  the  old  gentleman  had  laid  an  indignant 
hand  on  the  other  father's  shoulder. 

"You  mean  to  tell  me,"  he  demanded,  "that 
your  son,  twice  badly  wounded,  has  been  sent 
back  to  the  firing-line  again?" 

'T  do.   He's  there  now." 

For  the  second  time  that  day  the  old  gentleman 
began  to  shake  his  fist. 

''It's  monstrous!"  he  shouted.  "It's  damnable! 
They  did  the  same  thing  to  my  boy  —  my  only 
surviving  boy!  It's  this  infernal  system  of  throw- 
ing all  the  burden  on  the  willing  horse  —  this 
miserable  cringing  to  so-called  Labour!"  He 
choked.  "The  Government  ...  If  I  were  Lloyd 
George  .  .  ."  He  exploded.  "Pah!" 

"Never  mind,"  said  a  soothing  voice  from  the 
interior  of  the  cab.  "If  he  won't  go,  he  won't. 
Besides,  it's  no  use  making  him  violent.  I  dare 
say  I  shall  be  able  to  get  another  taxi.  Will  you 
please  open  this  door,  Constable?  It  seems  to 
have  stuck." 

The  two  parents  stopped  short,  guiltily  con- 
scious of  having  strayed  from  their  text.  Al 
Thompson  addressed  the  driver. 

"Say,  friend,"  he  enquired,  "'ain't  you  got 
enough  gas  to  take  this  lady  where  she  belongs?" 

"Gas?"  The  taxi-driver  glared  suspiciously. 

"He  means  petrol,"  interpreted  the  Special. 

"I  got  about  an  inch-and-a-'alf  in  me  tank," 
replied  the  taxi-driver,  half-resuming  his  profes- 
sional air  of  martyrdom.  "I  been  on  this  box  since 
eight  this  mornin',  and  ain't  'ad  a  bite  o'  dinner; 


THREE  MUSKETEERS  71 

but  I'll  take  the  lady  anywheres  in  reason.  She 
ain't  arst  me  yet.  I  don't  want  to  be  disobligin' 
to  nobody.  'Elp  everybody,  and  everybody '11 
'elp  you!  That's  my  motto.  Give  us  a  'and, 
matey"  —  to  Al  Thompson  —  "and  back  my 
keb  off  the  curb.  Crank  'er  up,  Jock!  Thanks! 
Good-mornin',  all!  Good-mornin',  sir!" 

"Good-morning!"  called  the  old  gentleman. 
"You  have  my  card.  Come  and  tell  me  how  your 
sons  are  doing.  Meanwhile  I'll  tackle  those  rascals. 
We'll  get  something  done!  Twice  wounded!  The 
same  old  story!  Oh,  criminal!  Monstrous!  Da  — " 

The  cab  rattled  away,  leaving  the  old  gentle- 
man to  apostrophize  His  Majesty's  Government. 
The  Special,  with  the  air  of  a  man  who  has  per- 
formed a  difficult  and  delicate  task  with  con- 
summate tact,  packed  up  his  pocket-book  and 
resumed  his  beat. 

"And  now,"  enquired  the  peevish  voice  of  Joe 
McCarthy,  ''Where  do  we  eatf" 

They  dined  at  a  red  plush  restaurant  somewhere 
off  the  Strand,  and  were  introduced  to  some  further 
War  economies. 

First,  the  waitress.  By  rights  she  should  have 
been  a  waiter. 

"Bin  here  nearly  two  years,  now,"  she  informed 
them.  "The  last  man  here  was  called  up  in  March. 
Sorry  for  the  Army  if  there's  many  more  like  him 
in  it.  Flat  feet,  something  cruel.  Anyhow,  there's 
only  us  girls  now." 

"And  varra  nice,  too!"  ventured  Andrew 
Drummond. 


72  THE  LAST  MILLION 

''None  of  your  sauce,  Scottie,"  came  the  reply, 
promptly,  but  without  rancour. 

"You're  married,  ma'm,  I  see,"  said  Al  Thomp- 
son deferentially  with  a  glance  at  her  left  hand. 

"Widow,"  said  the  girl  briefly.  "Since  the 
Somme,  two  years  ago." 

"That's  too  bad,"  observed  Al,  painfully  con- 
scious of  the  inadequacy  of  the  remark. 

"Most  of  us  has  lost  some  one.  In  the  house 
where  my  sister 's  in  service  there 's  three  gone  — 
all  officers.  I'm  not  one  to  ask  for  sympathy  when 
there's  others  needs  it  more,"  replied  this  sturdy 
little  city  sparrow.  "Carry  on  —  that's  my 
motto!  He  was  in  the  Field  Artillery:  just  bin 
promoted  bombardier.  Got  any  meat  coupons?" 

They  shook  their  heads.  As  regularly  rationed 
soldiers  they  were  free  from  such  statutory  fetters. 

"Better  have  bacon  and  eggs,"  announced 
Hebe.  "They're  not  rationed."  She  dealt  them 
each  a  slice  of  War  bread.  Butter  they  found  was 
unobtainable;  so  was  sugar.  Andrew  suggested 
that  the  party  should  solace  itself  with  beer;  but 
his  companions,  like  most  Americans,  whether 
of  the  dry  habit  or  the  wet,  preferred  to  drink 
water  with  their  actual  meals.  The  fact  that  the 
water  when  served  was  tepid  received  due  com- 
ment from  Joe  McCarthy. 

"That's  the  way  folks  always  tak'  it  here," 
explained  Andrew.  "I  dinna  often  drink  it  mysel', 
I  canna  see  what  other  kind  o'  water  ye  could 
expect." 

"You  could  put  ice  in  it,"  grunted  Joe. 


THREE  MUSKETEERS  73 

"Ice?"  The  Scottish  soldier  explained  the 
omission  with  elaborate  tact.  "In  this  country," 
he  pointed  out,  "ice  is  no  obtainable  in  the  sum- 
mer-time. We  are  situated  here  in  the  Temperate 
Zone,  and  if  a  body  needs  ice,  he  has  tae  wait  till 
the  winter  for  it.  Oot  in  Amerikey  I  doot  ye '11 
be  able  tae  gather  it  all  the  year  roond.  Aye! 
couldna  fancy  iced  watter  mysel'.  It  must  be  sair 
cauld  tae  the  stomach." 

Ice  being  unobtainable,  it  was  obviously  futile 
to  ask  for  ice-cream.  Sweet  corn  the  waitress  had 
never  heard  of:  the  mention  of  waffles  merely 
produced  an  indulgent  shake  of  the  head.  How- 
ever, a  timid  enquiry  for  pie  —  after  Andrew  had 
amended  the  wording  to  "tart"  — was  more 
successful.  It  was  obvious  War-pie,  but  it  satis- 
fied. 

"And,"  enquired  their  conductor,  as  they 
shouldered  their  way,  full-fed,  into  the  Strand, 
"where  are  you  boys  for  now?" 

They  were  bound,  it  seemed,  for  a  great  Ball 
Game  between  the  American  Navy  and  Army, 
at  a  place  caUed  Stamford  Bridge.  This  was  out- 
side the  ken  of  Andrew  Drummond,  but  a  police- 
man directed  their  attention  to  the  Underground 
Railway  System  of  London. 

Presently  they  found  themselves  at  the  great 
football  ground,  converted  for  the  time  being  into 
American  territory.  It  is  true  that  King  George 
himself  sat  in  the  Grand  Stand,  surrounded  by 
Generals,  Admirals,  and  Councillors.  It  is  true 
that  thousands  of  British  soldiers,  sailors,  and 


74  THE  LAST  MILLION 

civilians  lined  the  ground,  and  that  British  brass 
bands  made  indefatigable  music.  But  it  was 
America's  day.  From  the  moment  when  the  teams 
lined  up,  and  the  two  captains  were  presented  to 
the  King  by  an  American  Vice-Admiral  and  an 
American  Major-General,  the  proceedings  were 
controlled  by  the  fans  and  rooters  of  the  American 
Navy  and  Army. 

How  far  the  British  contingent  followed  the 
intricacies  of  the  combat  it  is  difficult  to  say. 
When  Al  Thompson  pointed  out  a  sturdy  but 
medium-sized  player,  and  announced  that  he  had 
once  been  a  Giant,  Andrew  Drummond  merely 
wondered  vaguely  why  he  had  shrunk.  When 
another  player  was  uproariously  identified  as  a 
late  Captain  of  the  Red  Socks,  the  English  spec- 
tators mentally  registered  the  Red  Socks  as  some 
obsolescent  Indian  tribe  —  like  the  Blackfeet. 

But  you  cannot,  as  has  been  well  said  during  this 
War,  remain  neutral  on  a  moral  issue.  Within 
twenty  minutes  every  one  on  the  ground  was 
shouting  "Attaboy!"  or  consigning  the  umpire  to 
perdition,  or  endeavouring  to  imitate  the  con- 
certed war-songs  of  the  rival  sides.  When  the 
sailors  won  the  game  by  a  narrow  margin  every 
soldier  present,  American  or  British,  lamented  to 
heaven. 

"This  is  the  End  of  a  Perfect  Day,  I  guess," 
remarked  that  most  satisfactory  guest,  Al  Thomp- 
son, as  the  trio  made  their  way  arm  in  arm  along 
the  crowded  Strand  in  the  cool  of  the  evening. 
''What  do  you  say,  Ed?" 


THREE  MUSKETEERS  75 

"Sure!"  replied  Mr.  Gillette.  ''Fine!" 

''You  all  right,  Joe?"  enquired  Al. 

The  carper  made  no  reply,  but  looked  about 
him  with  a  dissatisfied  air. 

"Seems  to  me,"  he  remarked  querulously, 
"that  this  War  ain't  such  a  fierce  proposition  as 
folks  made  out.  Look  at  these  people  all  enjoying 
themselves." 

"Well,  I  guess  they  done  their  day's  work," 
said  Gillette  pacifically.  "Besides,  most  of  them 
are  in  khaki  —  or  else  that  hospital  uniform"  — 
as  a  string  of  char-d-bancs  conveying  convalescents 
to  the  theatre  rattled  cheerfully  past. 

But  the  misanthrope  would  not  be  denied. 

"These  here  wounded  don't  appear  to  be 
wounded  so  bad,"  he  grumbled.  "You  don't  never 
see  no  seriously  wounded  men  in  the  streets  of 
this  town." 

"No,"  rapped  out  Al  Thompson,  ruffled  for 
once,  "and  you  don't  see  no  dead  laying  around 
neither!  I  guess  if  you  was  to  take  a  walk  through 
a  hospital,  Joe  McCarthy  —  No,  you  can  cancel 
the  hospital.  This  will  do." 

They  had  reached  Charing  Cross  Station.  From 
the  farther  gate  streamed  a  slow-moving  proces- 
sion of  loaded  Red  Cross  ambulances.  Another 
procession,  empty,  was  moving  in  at  the  nearer 
gate,  to  disappear  inside  the  station.  Down  an 
adjacent  street  stretched  a  line  of  more  ambulances, 
and  more  yet.  But  the  busy  crowd  in  the  Strand 
gave  Httle  heed  to  the  spectacle.  They  had  wit- 
nessed it,  or  could  have  witnessed  it,  at  this  hour 


76  THE  LAST  MILLION 

and  in  this  place,  among  others,  any  evening 
during  the  past  four  years. 

Our  friends  halted,  waiting  for  an  opening  in 
the  close-moving  stream.  Presently  it  slowed 
down  and  stopped,  and  Joe  McCarthy  led  the  way 
across.  But  he  paused  curiously,  as  did  the  others, 
at  the  open  back  of  an  ambulance,  and  peered  in. 

The  car  contained  four  passengers.  Each  lay 
very  still  upon  his  stretcher  —  two  upon  the  floor, 
and  the  other  two  packed  neatly  on  shelves  over- 
head. All  were  rolled  up  in  brown  Army  blankets. 
From  the  end  of  one  of  these  protruded  a  heavily 
sphnted  and  bandaged  foot.  Another  man  had 
his  arm  strapped  across  his  chest.  The  third  lay 
on  his  face,  his  back  torn  by  shrapnel.  The  fourth 
lay  on  his  back.  His  head  was  swathed  in  band- 
ages, and  only  one  eye  was  visible.  It  was  closed. 
One  hand  was  bandaged;  the  other  clasped  to  his 
bosom  a  German  sniper's  helmet. 

As  they  gazed,  another  figure  edged  in  beside 
them  —  a  London  flower-girl,  in  the  usual  dilapi- 
dated shawl  and  deplorable  hat,  with  her  fragrant 
stock-in-trade  clasped  in  the  hollow  of  her  left 
arm.  She  plucked  a  couple  of  pink  carnations  from 
a  bundle,  and  flung  them  to  the  man  with  the 
bandaged  head. 

"For  you,  ole  sport,"  she  announced,  "with 
my  love.  So  long!" 

The  wounded  man  opened  his  visible  eye  and 
smiled  his  thanks;  and  the  girl  was  passing  on  to 
the  next  ambulance,  there  to  squander  more  of  her 
sole  means  of  livelihood,  when  a  hand  of  iron  fell 


THREE  MUSKETEERS  77 

upon  her  shoulder.  On  the  defensive  in  a  moment, 
she  whirled  round. 

"Nar,  then!  You  stop  pawdn'  me!  I  never  done 
no  — 

But  Joe  INIcCarthy,  misanthrope,  merely  de- 
prived her  of  the  bundle  of  pink  carnations,  placing 
in  her  grimy  palm  in  exchange  all  the  money  he 
happened  to  have  with  him.  It  was  roughly  three 
days'  pay  —  no  mean  sum  in  the  most  highly  paid 
Army  in  the  world.  Then  leaning  into  the  ambu- 
lance, which  had  begun  to  move  again,  he  depos- 
ited the  flowers  beside  the  wounded  soldier,  and 
said  gruffly : 

''Say,  Tommy!" 

The  solitary  eye  opened  again,  and  a  voice 
replied : 

"Tommy  yourself!  I'm  from  Elizabeth,  New 
Jersey.  We're  all  Doughboys  in  here." 

The  Thi-ee  Musketeers,  thrilled  to  the  core, 
broke  into  a  trot,  and  panted: 

"You  don't  say?  Where  you  been  fighting?" 

"Place called Belleau  Wood.  Good-night,  boys! " 

It  was  their  first  contact  with  actuality. 


CHAPTER  EIGHT 

THE  PROMISED  LAND 

We  have  now  discovered  France.  Our  first  impres- 
sion of  that  fair  but  voluble  land  is  one  of  amaze- 
ment that  the  inhabitants  should  be  able  to  speak 
such  a  difficult  language  so  fluently.  Even  the 
children  can  do  it. 

Later,  we  modified  that  opinion  —  either  be- 
cause we  found  that  the  French  tongue  was  not 
so  difficult  as  we  had  imagined,  or  more  probably 
because  we  had  learned  that  in  France  a  knowledge 
of  French  is  not  so  indispensable  —  at  any  rate, 
in  war-time  —  as  we  had  imagined.  Indeed,  we 
found  the  French  language  quite  as  intelligible 
as  some  of  the  English  rural  dialects.  Contrari- 
wise, the  French  appeared  to  understand  our  mode 
of  expression  much  more  readily  than  some  of  our 
English  hosts. 

For  instance,  if  you  ask  an  English  railway 
porter  for  such  a  simple  thing  as  the  check-room 
or  the  news-stand,  he  will  simply  gape  at  you; 
whereas,  if  you  stride  into  a  French  country  hotel 
and  hold  up  one  finger  —  naturally  one  has  to 
employ  gesture  just  a  little  with  the  Latin  races  — 
and  say  ''Oon  room!"  in  a  firm  voice,  the  pro- 
prietor will  comprehend  at  once,  and  smilingly 
hand  you  a  key  right  away.  One  can  only  ascribe 
this  instant  sympathy  to  the  freemasonry  of  a 
common  democratic  ideal.  Or  it  may  be  that  a 


THE  PROMISED  LAND  79 

room  is  the  only  thing  which  a  hotel  proprietor 
could  expect  a  stranger  carrying  a  grip  to  ask  for. 

However,  this  by  the  way.  The  main  point  is 
that  we  are  at  last  in  France  —  France,  the  land 
of  the  Great  Adventure,  for  which  oar  ardent 
dreams  and  hard  training  have  been  shaping  us 
for  months  past. 

Still,  at  first  sight  it  is  not  too  easy  to  realize 
that  we  are  there  at  all;  for  the  surroundings  in 
which  we  found  ourselves  on  landing  might  have 
been  lifted  bodily  from  Hoboken. 

Speaking  of  Hoboken,  we  note  that  the  prevail- 
ing slogan  of  the  moment,  posted  on  barrack  walls> 
painted  on  transport  wagons,  even  blazoned  in 
stencilled  letters  across  the  wind-shields  of  Staff 
automobiles,  is:  Heaven,  Hell,  or  Hoboken  by 
Christmas!  To  this  pious  aspiration  one  ardent 
spirit  has  added,  in  smaller  lettering:  But  let  it  he 
Hoboken,  please,  via  Berlin! 

Certainly,  the  Armies  of  Invasion,  both  friendly 
and  hostile,  have  transformed  France,  each  in  its 
own  way.  The  Hun  in  the  east  has  effected  his 
share  of  the  transformation  in  his  own  way,  by 
fire,  rapine,  and  pillage.  But  the  British  and 
Americans  in  the  west  have  left  a  mark  just  as 
unmistakable  and,  it  is  to  be  hoped,  more  endur- 
ing. A  great  army  cannot  disembark  upon  the  soil 
of  another  people's  country  without  importing 
a  great  deal  of  its  own  personality  at  the  same 
time.  That  accounts  for  the  foregoing  reference  to 
Hoboken.  The  amount  of  portable  property  that 
we  have  brought  with  us  is  enormous.  There  were 


80  THE  LAST  MILLION 

days,  not  far  distant,  when  a  soldier  subsisted 
upon  the  country  wherein  he  found  himself. 
During  the  Shenandoah  Valley  campaign  Stone- 
wall Jackson's  men  lived  on  unripe  corn  and  green 
apples,  for  the  very  good  reason  that  there  existed 
no  means  of  providing  them  with  anything  else. 
Throughout  the  centuries  this  fact  has  kept  ex- 
peditionary forces  down  to  reasonable  numbers; 
the  size  of  an  army  was  limited  to  the  capacity  of 
the  country  to  support  it.  But  modern  science  has 
changed  all  that.  Canned  meat  has  revolutionized 
warfare  far  more  surely  and  permanently  than  the 
aeroplane  or  the  submarine.  It  is  now  possible,  by 
modern  methods  of  food  preservation  and  trans- 
portation, to  arm  practically  a  whole  nation  and 
maintain  it  continuously  and  comfortably  in  the 
field  thousands  of  miles  from  its  base  of  supplies. 
That  is  why  France  is  the  most  overcrowded  and 
best-fed  country  in  the  world  to-day. 

Modern  transportation  has  also  made  possible 
—  which  in  warfare  means  indispensable  —  the 
intensive  employment  of  heavy  artillery.  We  use 
siege  guns  to-day  where  yesterday  we  employed 
eighteen-pounders  and  seventy-fives.  That  in- 
volves the  construction  of  complicated  railroad 
systems  —  tracks,  sidings,  locomotives,  ammuni- 
tion-wagons —  all  over  the  country,  operating 
forward  and  sideways  behind  the  line.  Two  years 
ago  —  twelve  months  ago  —  the  spot  where  we 
find  ourselves  was  a  sleepy  third-rate  seaport, 
whose  very  existence  was  known  to  few  English- 
speaking  people,   save  the  captains   of  Channel 


THE  PROMISED  LAND  81 

coasters.  To-day  that  port  still  slumbers  in  the 
Brittany  sunshine,  but  it  has  thrown  out  an 
annexe  many  times  larger  than  itself,  comprising 
a  complete  system  of  docks  and  basins,  two  hun- 
dred and  fifty  miles  of  railroad  siding,  and  enough 
storage  accommodation  to  house  two  million  tons 
of  military  supplies. 

But  American  acti\dty  has  not  halted  there.  To 
secure  a  pro\'ision  of  fair  drinking-water  for  the 
huge  population  of  this  mushroom  city  the  Engin- 
eers have  constructed  a  great  reservoir  among  the 
foothills  a  few  miles  away  —  an  enterprise  which 
frankly  astonishes  the  natives,  to  whom,  in  com- 
mon with  the  rest  of  their  countrymen,  water  as  a 
beverage  is  unknown. 

One  other  item  —  an  inevitable  item  —  swells 
the  population  of  the  district.  This  is  the  great 
American  Base  Hospital,  which  has  been  erected 
by  the  side  of  the  main  road  leading  inland  from 
the  coast.  The  hospital  is  a  city  in  itself.  Its  build- 
ings, cunningly  isolated  one  from  another,  cover 
many  acres,  and  contain  twenty-four  thousand 
beds.  Thank  God,  these  have  never  yet  all  been 
occupied  at  one  time. 

And  this  great  base  port  is  only  one  of  several. 
That  fact  is  borne  in  upon  us  at  every  turn  by  the 
prevalence  of  large  printed  signs,  headed,  Race  to 
Berlin !  which  plaster  the  town.  Upon  these  signs 
are  printed  in  column  down  the  left-hand  side  the 
names  of  all  the  base  ports  used  by  American 
troops  —  our  own  port  among  the  number.  At 
the  opposite  edge  of  the  sign  there  is  a  great  black 


82  THE  LAST  MILLION 

splash,  marked  Berlin.  The  splash  is  connected 
to  each  of  the  base  ports  by  a  straight  black  line. 
On  each  line,  at  varying  distances  from  the  base 
ports,  stands  a  small  movable  flag.  The  big  idea, 
any  passer-by  mil  tell  you,  is  to  stimulate  activity 
among  the  units  forming  the  Service  of  Supply  by 
means  of  healthy  competition.  Every  good  day's 
work  in  any  port  sets  the  flag  of  that  port  an  inch 
or  two  nearer  Berlin.  A  port  is  not  called  upon  to 
compete  with  other  ports  (which  would  be  mani- 
festly unfair,  for  some  are  larger  and  better 
equipped  than  others),  but  only  with  its  own 
previous  record  in  the  matter  of  unloading  ships, 
and  the  like. 

Attached  to  each  diagram  is  a  printed  notice, 
pointing  out  in  simple  language  that  hard  work 
at  the  base  is  just  as  indispensable  as  hard  fight- 
ing at  the  front,  and  that  when  Victory  comes  the 
credit  will  be  shared  equally  by  both  departments. 
Thte  notice  is  signed  John  J.  Pershing,  and  it  has 
roused  the  dusky  warriors  at  the  various  base 
ports  to  a  fever  of  emulation. 

Certainly  there  is  much  to  unload.  An  army 
carries  as  much  personal  baggage  as  a  prima  donna. 
Observe  these  wharves.  Here  are  great  naval  guns 

—  fourteen-inch.  They  are  like  millionaires,  be- 
cause each  requires  a  private  railway  train  of  its 
own.  In  fact  they  are  super-millionaires,  because 
each  requires  a  private  track  as  well.  There  are 
great  motor-lorries,  some  from  America,  some 
from  England.  There  is  a  fleet  of  rolHng  kitchens 

—  or  "soup-guns,"  as  the  Doughboy  calls  them  — 


THE  PROMISED  LAND  83 

awaiting  horse-traction.  At  present  they  are 
hitched  one  behind  another  Uke  a  string  of  ducks, 
and  are  attached  to  a  road  engine  for  transference 
to  the  forward  areas.  There  are  mighty  Mogul 
locomotives,  shipped  bodily  from  the  United 
States,  together  with  the  appurtenances  thereof  — 
even  that  mysterious  tolhng  bell  on  top  of  the  boiler. 

The  American  locomotive  bell  impresses  Euro- 
peans enormously.  They  wonder  what  it  is  for.  On 
the  whole  they  regard  it  with  reverence;  it  confers 
a  sort  of  ecclesiastical  sanctity  upon  American 
railroad  travel.  A  Scotsman  once  told  me  that 
whenever  he  visited  America  he  used  frequently 
to  wake  up  in  the  sleeping-car,  standing  in  some 
great  railroad  junction  in  the  small  hours,  under 
the  firm  impression  that  he  was  back  in  his  native 
town  on  a  Sunday  morning. 

As  for  the  ordinary  military  stores,  they  come 
in  one  unceasing  cataract.  Gasoline  tanks;  water- 
tanks;  cold-storage  carcasses;  bags  of  flour;  canned 
meat;  canned  fruit;  bales  of  clothing;  consign- 
ments of  tobacco;  chewing-gum,  books,  and  other 
comforts.  Liberty  motors;  aeroplanes;  machine 
guns;  spare  parts.  The  dingy,  oddly  painted  ships 
come  shding  down  from  the  horizon,  deposit  them 
all  in  mountain  ranges  upon  dock  and  wharf,  then 
turn  round  and  steal  back  to  America  for  more. 

Shells  are  not  landed  here.  They  are  touchy  and 
inflammable  folk,  and  have  a  private  and  exclusive 
place  of  debarkation  of  their  own,  higher  up  the 
river. 

But  there  is  human  freight  to  be  deposited  too. 


84  THE  LAST  MILLION 

Here  are  two  liners,  newly  docked.  Each,  despite 
her  great  size,  is  heeling  over  towards  the  wharf,  as 
the  biggest  ships  will  when  the  whole  cargo  hangs 
over  one  side.  One  cargo  is  white,  the  other  col- 
oured. 

''Where  yo'  from?"  shrieks  a  stevedore,  to  the 
dusky  grinning  human  mountain  above  him. 

"Seventy  fo',  Fo'teen  Street,  Lebanon,  Illinois!" 
pipes  a  solitary  voice  far  up  the  height,  before  any 
one  else  can  answer  the  question.  There  is  a  roar 
of  laughter  at  this  egotism,  and  another  voice 
from  the  wharf  enquires: 

''What  camp?" 

"Camp  Dodge!  Labour  Battalion!"  roars  an 
answering  chorus. 

"Step  right  down,  boys!  We  got  lots  of  labour 
for  you  heah!"  yells  the  humorist  on  the  wharf. 

The  white  contingent  on  the  other  ship  proves 
to  be  from  Camp  Sherman.  What  is  of  far  more 
importance,  however,  is  the  fact  that  both  ships 
possess  clean  bills  of  health,  only  nine  cases  of 
sickness  being  reported  altogether.  This  is  good 
news,  for  influenza  and  pneumonia  have  been  ram- 
pant. Troops  on  the  great  transports  have  been 
saddened  of  late  by  the  continuous  spectacle  of 
eager  young  hearts  committed  to  the  deep  without 
ever  having  beheld  their  Promised  Land.  There 
have  been  rumours,  too,  of  hundreds  of  stretcher- 
cases  landed  in  Liverpool  from  a  single  convoy. 
But  apparently  the  plague  is  stayed.  We  shall 
have  a  chance  now  to  be  killed  —  which  is  a  very 
different  matter  from  dying  like  a  common  civilian. 


THE  PROMISED  LAND  85 

In  due  course  the  gentleman  from  Fourteenth 
Street,  Lebanon,  IlHnois,  set  foot  upon  the  soil  of 
France  —  to  his  own  profound  relief.  His  name  was 
Joseph  Wilhams.  His  calUng,  up  to  date,  had  been 
that  of  elevator  attendant  in  the  leading  —  in  fact, 
the  only  —  hotel  in  his  native  town.  He  had  never 
been  from  home  in  his  life,  and  when  the  long  arm 
of  the  Selective  Draft  reached  out  from  Washing- 
ton, D.C.,  and  pounced  upon  Joseph  in  Lebanon 
and  dropped  him  into  the  maelstrom  of  Camp 
Dodge,  it  launched  him  upon  a  series  of  experiences 
so  novel  and  so  surprising  that  his  eyes  had  never 
quite  regained  their  sockets,  nor  had  his  mouth 
been  completely  closed,  since.  American  negroes 
vary  a  good  deal  in  tint,  but  there  were  no  half- 
measures  about  Joseph.  He  was  coal-black;  and 
as  his  teeth  and  the  whites  of  his  eyes  were  china- 
white,  he  furnished  a  most  effective  colour-scheme. 
He  was,  moreover,  a  youth  of  cheerful  counte- 
nance, and  performed  the  most  ordinary  military 
duties  with  an  air  of  rapturous  enjoyment. 

But  the  voyage  across  had  been  a  severe  trial. 
Joseph  had  never  seen  the  ocean  before,  and  his 
introduction  to  that  element  had  not  been  aus- 
picious. For  fifteen  long  days  the  convoy  had 
tumbled  and  lurched  through  the  Atlantic  wastes. 
The  weather  had  been  contrary;  fogs  numerous. 
The  lame  ducks  of  the  party  had  been  more  than 
usually  dilatory.  Joseph  and  his  brethren  —  pos- 
sibly with  some  long-dormant  ancestral  chord  of 
recollection  astir  within  them  —  had  been  first 
scared,  then  demoralized,  and  finally  had  given 


86  THE  LAST  MILLION 

up  hope.  After  the  first  week  they  abandoned  all 
expectation  of  ever  seeing  land  again.  Late  one 
night  the  officer  on  duty,  going  his  rounds  amid 
the  Chinese  opium-den  of  close-packed  bunks  in 
the  ship's  hold,  overheard  Joseph's  voice,  uplifted 
above  the  creaking  of  timbers  and  the  snores  of 
his  associates,  imploring  Providence  for  the  sight 
of  ''jus'  one  hT  lone  pine-tree  —  no  mo'  dan  dat!" 

—  as  a  divine  guarantee  that  the  deep  waters  of 
the  Atlantic  had  not  entirely  submerged  the 
habitable  globe. 

But  now,  Joseph  had  arrived.  He  was  ''right 
there."  The  sun  shone  warmly  upon  him,  and  the 
good  brown  earth  lay  firm  beneath  his  large  feet 

—  the  soil  of  France,  which  he  had  come  to  save. 
His  smile  expanded :  his  soul  burgeoned.  He  would 
explore  this  town,  and  fraternize  with  the  inhabit- 
ants. 

Leave  obtained,  he  set  forth.  He  observed  with 
approval,  as  a  member  of  a  family  which  had  de- 
rived its  income  for  generations  from  the  taking- 
in  of  other  people's  washing,  the  elaborately 
starched  and  frilled  caps  of  the  Normandy  fisher- 
women.  He  returned  with  interest  the  shy  smiles 
of  little  French  girls  in  wooden  sabots.  When  a 
bullet-headed  little  French  boy  in  a  long  black 
pinafore  stood  to  attention  upon  his  approach  and 
exclaimed,  "  Americain,  Salu-u-u-ut!''  Joseph  Wil- 
liams beamed  from  ear  to  ear. 

Presently,  emerging  from  the  town,  he  made  for 
the  open  country  —  a  country  of  undulating  sand- 
dunes,  with  here  and  there  a  windmill  atop,  fever- 


THE  PROMISED  LAND  87 

ishly  churning.  To  these  succeeded  green  fields, 
dotted  with  humble  farms  and  homesteads.  Joseph 
observed  that  all  these  buildings  were  of  stone  or 
brick,  wood  being  doubtless  unobtainable  in  this 
sterile  country.  The  inhabitants  were  not  numer- 
ous —  able-bodied  men  were  conspicuously  absent 
—  and  every  one  within  sight  appeared  to  be  work- 
ing. In  the  nearest  field  a  small  boy  was  directing 
the  movements  of  two  placid  horses  by  means  of 
that  peculiar  agonized  howl  with  which  a  French- 
man always  conducts  business  of  an  urgent  nature, 
whether  he  be  reviling  a  political  opponent  or  sell- 
ing evening  papers.  Farther  away  an  oldish  man  in 
French  Territorial  uniform  was  cutting  hay,  as- 
sisted by  two  strapping  young  women. 

Even  the  very  old  and  the  very  young  were  em- 
ployed. And  in  this  connection  Joseph  stumbled 
upon  the  ideal  occupation  for  persons  who  possess 
those  twin  adjuncts  of  the  philosopher  —  a  con- 
templative mind  and  a  dislike  for  work. 

Hitherto  the  summit  of  his  ambition  had  been  to 
stand  one  day  in  glorious  apparel  upon  the  tessel- 
lated flooring  of  a  great  New  York  hotel,  opposite 
the  elevators,  and  nod  his  head  in  Jove-Hke  fashion 
whenever  he  thought  it  desirable  that  another  ele- 
vator should  go  up.  But  now  another  and  more 
restful  career  presented  itself  to  him. 

Every  French  peasant  possesses  a  cow  or  two  — 
peradventure  half  a  dozen.  To  feed  these,  pasture- 
land  is  required.  But  no  thrifty  Frenchman  would 
set  aside  valuable  arable  land  for  this  purpose, 
when  the  roadside  is  free  to  all.  A  properly  edu- 


88  THE  LAST  MILLION 

cated  French  cow  can  always  be  relied  upon  to  ex- 
tract a  meal  from  the  strip  of  dusty  herbage  that 
runs  between  the  roadway  and  the  ditch  in  every 
country  lane  in  France.  The  trouble  is  that  such  a 
pasture  is  considerably  longer  than  it  is  broad  — 
three  feet  by  Infinity  is  the  dimension  —  and  a 
cow  of  epicurean  temperament  may  be  inclined  to 
wander  too  far,  or  even  lose  herself.  Therefore,  an 
escort  must  be  provided  —  usually  for  each  indi- 
vidual cow,  for  the  collective  convoy  system  is  of 
little  practical  use  here.  So  the  Landsturm  is  called 
out.  At  early  dawn  Grandpere  totters  off  up  the 
road  escorting,  let  us  say,  Rosalie;  while  Toinette, 
aged  six,  departs  in  the  opposite  direction,  with 
the  inevitable  huge  umbrella  under  one  arm  and 
Victorine's  leading-string  under  the  other.  Thus 
the  day  is  spent.  It  is  a  day  without  haste,  without 
heat;  for  the  pace  is  that  of  a  browsing  cow.  More- 
over, it  is  a  day  without  supervision  —  grateful 
and  comforting  to  an  enlisted  man  of  six  months' 
standing  —  and  its  responsibilities  are  limited  to 
steering  the  cow  out  of  the  way  of  approaching 
traffic,  either  by  personal  appeal  from  the  shade  of 
a  neighbouring  tree,  or  in  extreme  cases  with  the 
umbrella.  It  is  not  necessary  to  observe  a  course  or 
take  bearings:  you  may  simply  drift,  because  the 
cow  always  knows  the  way  home.  Decidedly,  said 
Joseph  Williams  to  himself,  this  was  the  life.  Ele- 
vator-starting was  a  sociable  and  decorative  call- 
ing, but  made  too  severe  a  demand  upon  the  facul- 
ties. After  the  war  he  would  settle  right  here  in 
France  and  chaperon  a  cow. 


THE  PROMISED  LAND  89 

It  was  at  this  point  that  Joseph  went  finally  to 
sleep,  in  the  shadow  of  the  cow  which  had  started 
his  train  of  thought.  He  awoke  greatly  refreshed  — 
he  had  arrears  of  sleep  to  make  up  after  the  dis- 
comforts of  the  voyage  —  and  set  out  for  the 
town,  with  his  mind  a  luxurious  blank,  except  for 
two  small  matters.  First,  the  entire  absence  of  any 
suggestion  of  war.  Joseph  had  half  expected  to  find 
his  landing  disputed  by  the  full  strength  of  the 
German  Army.  Conversation  on  board  had  tended 
that  way,  and  he  had  promised  himself  a  happy 
hour  writing  home  to  describe  how  he,  followed  by 
his  devoted  adherents,  had  triumphantly  over- 
come the  foe's  resistance.  In  fact,  he  had  written 
the  letter  already.  Second,  every  one  in  this  coun- 
try appeared  to  be  white  —  French  soldiers,  French 
sailors,  French  civihans.  He  longed  for  the  sight  of 
one  ebony  face.  Even  a  mahogany  one  would  do. 

And  on  the  outskirts  of  the  town  the  latter 
wish  was  gratified.  A  sudden  turn  in  the  road 
brought  him  face  to  face  with  his  own  double  —  or 
very  nearly.  The  double  was  attired  in  what  Joseph 
took  to  be  a  French  uniform  of  some  kind,  the  most 
conspicuous  and  enviable  items  of  which  were  im- 
mensely baggy  trousers  and  a  red  fez. 

The  double,  after  one  glance  at  Joseph's  modest 
khaki  uniform  and  homely  features,  broke  into  a 
dazzling  smile.  The  pair  advanced  rapidly  upon 
one  another  and  shook  hands  with  enormous  en- 
thusiasm. Both  broke  into  speech  simultaneously. 

Then  befell  the  tragedy.  Each  spoke  a  tongue 
entirely  incomprehensible  to  the  other! 


90  THE  LAST  MILLION 

Each  paused,  incredulous;  then,  convinced 
there  must  be  some  mistake,  began  again.  Then 
came  another  pause.  A  look  of  almost  pathetic  be- 
wilderment appeared  upon  each  honest  counte- 
nance —  countenances  almost  identical  in  shade 
and  feature.  Then  Joseph  exclaimed: 

"Why,  nigger,  what  so't  of  fancy  nigger  does  yo' 
think  yo' is?" 

The  gentleman  in  the  fez  retaliated  with  a  query 
which,  to  judge  by  sound  and  intonation,  was  very 
similar  to  Joseph's. 

The  look  of  bewilderment  on  Joseph's  face 
gave  place  to  a  severe  frown,  which  was  immedi- 
ately reflected  in  that  of  his  double.  Each  of  these 
children  of  Ham  now  darkly  suspected  the  other  of 
imposture. 

''Don'  yo'  go  an'  get  fresh  with  me,  nigger!"  said 
Joseph,  in  a  warning  voice. 

"Yakki-wakki-hikki-doolah!'^  growled  the  other 
—  or  words  to  that  effect. 

Joseph  lost  all  patience.  His  voice  suddenly  shot 
up  an  octave  higher,  and  he  screamed : 

''You  ain't  no  nigger  at  all!  You're  only  a 
Af'ican!" 

Possibly  it  was  in  self-compensation  for  this  dis- 
illusioning encounter  that  Joseph  promptly  mailed 
to  his  affianced  in  distant  Lebanon,  Illinois,  the 
letter  which  has  been  mentioned  above.  It  began: 

Well,  honey,  we  has  arrived  in  France,  and  this  war  sure 
is  fierce.  Every  time  I  steps  outside  my  dugout  I  wades  up 
to  my  knees  in  blood.  .  .  . 


CHAPTER  NINE 

THE  EXILES 

So  tremendous  was  America's  response  when  in 
the  spring  of  this  year  the  call  came  to  her  from  the 
Western  Front  to  hurry,  so  overwhelming  the  host 
which  she  sent  over,  that  our  chief  difficulty  to-day 
is  not  to  withstand  the  Hun,  but  to  find  a  vacant 
spot  on  his  carcass  to  hit. 

We  have  been  in  France  for  over  a  month  now, 
but  so  far  our  services  as  a  unit  have  not  been  re- 
quu-ed  in  the  Line.  But  we  are  acclimatized  by  this 
time.  The  days  of  our  green  youth  in  the  big  camps 
back  home  have  faded  away  as  though  they  never 
had  been.  In  this  Old- World,  constricted  country 
it  requires  quite  an  effort  of  memory  to  recall  those 
spacious  days  upon  our  own  open,  rolling  plains 
and  hillsides.  Gone  are  the  great  streets  of  wooden 
two-storey  huts,  with  their  electric  fight,  steam 
heat,  and  hot  showers;  the  various  social  centres; 
the  roaring  Liberty  Theatre  and  the  Hostess 
House;  the  candy-stores  and  the  shoe-shine  par- 
lours. They  are  but  a  memory,  blurred  by  four 
months  of  incredibly  novel  experience. 

To-day  we  sleep  in  French  barracks  —  bleak, 
cheerless  buildings,  redolent  of  floor-soap  and  white- 
wash; or  in  billets  up  and  down  a  little  village;  or 
in  some  great  barn,  on  straw,  or  under  the  summer 
stars  in  our  dog-tents.  We  perform  our  ablutions  in 
the  open  air,  mainly  at  a  farm  pump  or  street  hy- 


92  THE  LAST  MILLION 

drant,  to  the  diversion  of  the  female  population. 
For  recreation  we  still  play  baseball;  for  creature 
comforts  we  can  turn  to  the  Red  Cross,  or  the 
Y.M.C.A.,  or  the  Knights  of  Columbus,  or  the 
Salvation  Army,  or  the  Jewish  Welfare  Board. 
There  is  also  a  French  institution,  known  as  Le 
Foyer  du  Soldat,  where  we  consort  with  grave- 
faced,  courteous  poilus.  We  have  encountered  no 
British  troops  so  far.  They  are  farther  north:  sev- 
eral of  our  units  have  gone  up  to  be  brigaded  with 
them. 

So  here  we  are  —  right  here  in  France  —  ab- 
sorbing new  atmosphere  through  our  pores.  We 
are  on  a  strict  war  footing,  too.  Everything,  as  the 
Colonel  has  explained  to  us,  must  be  "just  so."  If 
you  are  ordered  to  be  at  a  certain  cross-road  ten 
miles  away,  with  your  company,  at  9  a.m.  to-mor- 
row morning,  with  picks  and  shovels  and  two  days' 
rations,  you  have  to  be  there  —  just  there  —  not 
at  9.05,  with  picks  but  no  shovels,  or  with  one  day's 
rations  instead  of  two,  but  at  9  precisely,  with  the 
exact  outfit  prescribed.  The  accomplishment  of 
this  feat  is  not  so  easy  as  it  sounds:  it  involves 
much  study,  and  occasional  weariness  of  the  flesh. 
You  must  be  able  not  only  to  read  a  map  correctly, 
but  to  visualize  from  a  scrutiny  of  the  same  the 
exact  nature  of  the  country  through  which  you  are 
going  to  lead  your  company  —  whether  it  is  hilly 
or  no;  whether  the  hill  runs  up  or  down;  whether 
there  are  grade  crossings  or  narrow  bridges  or  one- 
way roads  to  be  considered;  whether  a  ford  marked 
"Passable  for  troops"  is  also  passable  for  the 


THE  EXILES  93 

wheeled  transport  which  carries  your  picks  and 
shovels.  All  these  possibilities  make  for  delay  — 
sometimes  most  excusable  delay.  But  excuses 
are  not  accepted  in  war-time.  Either  you  succeed 
or  you  fail:  there  is  no  intermediate  stage.  Boone 
Cruttenden's  plan  —  and  a  very  good  one  too  —  is 
to  try  experiments,  not  upon  his  men,  but  upon 
himself.  In  his  spare  moments  he  is  accustomed  to 
figure  out,  with  the  aid  of  the  map  and  a  mekome- 
ter,  how  long  it  would  take  a  body  of  armed  men  to 
cover  some  given  distance  on  the  map,  having  re- 
gard to  the  possibility  of  — 

(1)  Unexpectedly  heavy  going. 

(2)  Roads  blocked  by  other  troops. 

(3)  Having  to  scatter  or  take  cover,  owing  to  enemy 

aeroplanes. 

(4)  The  cussedness  of  transport  mules. 

(5)  Other  visitations  of  Providence. 

He  then  enlists  the  services  of  a  friend  —  usually 
Jim  Nichols  —  and  the  pair  proceed  to  test  their 
own  theories  by  performing  the  journey  in  person, 
at  the  pace  of  a  marching  company,  correcting  their 
calculations  as  they  proceed.  It  is  upon  such  painful 
foundations  that  your  true  soldier  is  built  up. 

And  discipline  is  rigid.  If  the  top  sergeant  in- 
structs Mr.  Joe  McCarthy  to  empty  certain  buck- 
ets of  kitchen  garbage,  and  that  right  speedily,  Joe 
no  longer  explains  that  he  is  here  not  to  empty 
garbage,  but  to  make  the  world  safe  for  Democracy. 
He  simply  departs  with  the  buckets,  somewhat 
dazed  at  his  own  alacrity.  War  has  her  victories,  no 
less  than  Peace. 


.94  THE  LAST  MILLION 

Saluting  is  universal  now.  We  take  a  pride  in  it. 
Formerly  we  did  not.  Our  independent  natures 
rebelled  against  its  suggestion  of  servility.  But  we 
have  recently  realized  that  a  slave  is  a  man  who 
bends  his  knee  and  bows  his  head.  A  soldier  does 
neither.  He  holds  himself  erect,  looks  his  brother  in 
arms  straight  in  the  face,  and  exchanges  with  him 
the  proudest  of  all  masonic  signs. 

We  are  much  interested  in  the  saluting  methods 
of  our  Allies.  The  Frenchman  salutes  with  the 
open  hand,  palm  forward  and  fingers  pointing  up- 
ward. The  Britisher  brings  his  elbow  into  play,  and 
salutes  with  horizontal  forearm.  Both  French  and 
British  officers  salute  in  different  fashion  from 
their  men. 

The  British  practise  strange  refinements  of  their 
own.  Bond,  the  stout  medical  Major  whom  last  we 
met  travelling  in  a  railway  compartment  from 
Liverpool,  —  yes,  we  may  as  well  divulge  it;  it  was 
Liverpool,  —  was  one  of  the  first  Americans  to 
make  a  serious  attempt  to  grapple  with  the  funda- 
mental laws  of  the  subject.  Almost  immediately  on 
arrival  he  was  sent  to  Belgium,  with  other  mem- 
bers of  the  craft,  to  render  invaluable  assistance  at 
a  British  Casualty  Clearing-Station  not  far  from 
Ypres  —  that  graveyard  of  British  soldiers  and 
German  hopes.  He  observed  with  approval  the 
punctilious,  if  complicated,  fashion  in  which  all 
ranks  greeted  one  another  in  public  places,  and  set 
himself  to  take  notes  and  master  the  combina- 
tion. Two  months  later,  a  prey  to  overstrain,  he 
took  a  week's  leave  in  Paris,  where  he  encountered 


THE  EXILES  95 

that  eccentric  but  companionable  Anglo-American, 
Major  Floyd. 

They  exchanged  greetings  and  news.  Floyd,  it 
seemed,  was  now  attached  to  the  American  Army, 
having  been  appointed  a  liaison  officer.  Then  Bond 
said:  "Floyd,  I  am  glad  I  met  you.  You  are  one  of 
the  most  lucid  exponents  of  British  institutions  in 
captivity,  and  I  want  you  to  explain  to  me  just 
half  a  dozen  or  so  of  the  most  common  variations 
of  the  British  military  salute." 

Floyd  nodded  sympathetically. 

''I  know,"  he  said.  "It  seems  compHcated,  but 
all  you  have  to  do  is  to  get  hold  of  the  fundamental 
idea.  Here  it  is.  The  one  thing  a  British  soldier 
must  never  do  is  to  remove  his  cap." 

"Why?" 

"If  he  takes  it  off,  he  is  'improperly  dressed'; 
and  that  practically  disquahfies  him  from  'getting 
on  with  the  war'  for  the  time  being.  So  he  remains 
covered,  indoors  and  out,  except  in  church  and 
during  certain  portions  of  the  burial  service.  In 
fact,  at  moments  of  ceremonial  intensity,  such  as 
the  playing  of  the  National  Anthem,  when  civilians 
are  reverently  baring  their  heads,  the  soldier  has 
to  grab  his  cap  and  put  it  on  quickly." 

"Otherwise  he  cannot  come  to  the  salute?" 

"Cannot?  Must  not!  It  is  a  military  crime  to 
salute  bareheaded.  It  says  so  in  the  book." 

"I  see,"  said  Bond  musingly.  "That  accounts 
for  the  fact  that  if  I  happened  to  meet  a  hospital 
orderly  around  the  Casualty  Clearing-Station  with- 
out his  cap,  he  never  saluted  me?" 


96  THE  LAST  MILLION 

"Precisely." 

''Then  why  — "  Bond  hesitated. 

'T  know  your  trouble,"  said  Floyd,  fixing  his 
melancholy  gaze  upon  the  Major's  puzzled  face. 
"Instead  of  saluting  you,  he  gave  you  a  glare  of 
withering  contempt?" 

"He  certainly  did.  But  how  did  you  know?" 

"Because  that  was  what  it  looked  like  —  to  you. 
In  reahty  the  poor  fellow  was  only  doing  what  the 
Book  says.  He  was  turning  his  head  'smartly 
towards  the  officer,  while  passing.'" 

"That  explains  quite  a  lot.  I  was  afraid  it  was  I 
who  was  in  wrong  in  some  way,  and  he  wanted  to 
tell  me  so,  but  was  prevented  by  the  bonds  of  dis- 
cipline from  doing  more  than  give  me  a  good  fierce 
look." 

"His  proceeding  was  perfectly  regular,"  said 
Floyd  gravely.  "But  that  is  not  all.  A  British  sol- 
dier is  debarred  from  saluting  not  only  when  bare- 
headed, but  whenever  he  is  occupied  in  such  a  man- 
ner as  to  prevent  him  doing  the  thing  in  proper 
style.  For  instance,  if  you  meet  Tommy  carrying  a 
bucket  or  riding  a  bicycle,  he  merely  gives  his  cele- 
brated head-jerk,  without  employing  his  hand  at 
all." 

"That  is  a  good  notion,"  said  Bond.  "I  shall 
adopt  it.  Last  week  I  was  riding  a  bicycle  myself, 
and  I  nearly  broke  my  collar-bone  through  letting 
go  with  one  hand  in  order  k)  salute  a  Brigadier- 
General  in  a  muddy  lane.  Luckily  I  fell  soft!" 

"It's  a  carefully  thought-out  system,"  agreed 
Floyd,  "and  perfectly  sound.  Nearly  everything  in 


THE  EXILES  97 

the  British  Drill  Book  is  —  so  far  as  it  goes.  In 
nineteen  fourteen  that  Drill  Book  put  into  the  field 
the  finest  army  that  has  ever  fought  under  the  Brit- 
ish flag.  Unfortunately  very  few  of  the  nation  had 
read  it.  When  the  War  broke  out  there  were  still 
some  forty  millions  of  us  who  regarded  it  as  a  purely 
humorous  publication.  If  they  had  listened  to  Lord 
Roberts  and  absorbed  its  gritty  contents,  instead 
of  lapping  up  predigested  pap  from  the  politicians, 
perhaps  there  would  have  been  no  War.  Anyway, 
some  of  my  best  friends  would  have  been  alive  to- 
day. Those  were  the  fellows,  Bond!  In  the  First 
Battle  of  Ypres  three  divisions  of  them,  dead  beat 
after  eight  weeks'  continuous  fighting,  stopped  four 
fresh  German  Army  Corps.  The  Drill  Book  taught 
them  how  to  do  that.  They  have  mostly  gone  West 
now;  but  I  for  one  will  salute  their  memory  so  long 
as  I  live,  cap  or  no  cap!" 

We  are  marching  up  the  Loire  now,  getting  nearer 
the  front  of  things  every  day.  Nantes  is  behind  us 
—  an  ancient  city  astride  the  river,  its  historic 
quays  crowded  with  American  shipping  and  its 
wharves  piled  high  with  the  products  of  those  two 
mighty  Allied  bases,  Chicago  and  Minneapolis. 

The  Loire  is  a  pleasant  stream.  It  is  neither  so 
broad  as  the  Mississippi  nor  so  deep  as  the  Hudson, 
but  it  will  serve.  Shoals  and  sand-bars  are  frequent 
upon  its  surface,  but  on  the  opposite  side  the  bank 
rises  up  to  a  quite  respectable  height,  pleasantly 
reminiscent,  at  one  or  two  points,  of  the  Palisades. 

And  the  towns  we  pass  through  are  fascinating. 


98  THE  LAST  MILLION 

For  one  thing,  they  come  upon  you  suddenly. 
American  towns  absorb  you  gradually.  First  an 
outlying  suburb,  with  maybe  the  terminus  of  the 
street-car  system.  Then  an  untidy  No  Man's  Land, 
neither  cultivated  nor  inhabited  —  mainly  vacant 
building  lots  —  decorated  along  the  route  with 
huge  advertisements,  chiefly  of  automobile  acces- 
sories. Here  and  there  you 'pass  a  gasoline  sta- 
tion or  roadhouse.  After  that,  by  degrees,  trim 
white  wooden  houses,  with  shady  piazzas ;  increas- 
ing traffic ;  and  finally,  fifteen-storey  office-buildings, 
shops,  hotels,  and  the  roar  of  the  town. 

But  in  Central  France  these  premonitory  symp- 
toms are  lacking.  Your  company  tramps  along  the 
winding  road  beside  the  river,  through  country  cul- 
tivated to  its  last  yard  —  a  country  of  hedges  and 
ditches  and  enclosed  fields.  A  bend  in  the  stream, 
and  lo!  before  you  rises  a  venerable  city,  piled  up 
on  the  ground  rising  from  the  river,  with  ancient 
bridges  spanning  the  stream  and  a  grey  cathedral 
crowning  the  whole.  There  are  no  suburbs,  no  ad- 
vertising boards,  no  gasoline  stations.  The  sea  of 
green  turf  continues  to  the  edge  of  the  city,  and 
very  often  laps  against  ramparts  a  thousand  years 
old.  You  march  in  under  the  resounding  arch  of  an 
ancient  gateway. 

The  streets  are  narrow;  the  gradient  is  frequently 
such  as  to  discommode  any  one  save  a  native  of 
Lynchburg,  Virginia.  The  shops  are  small,  and  the 
proprietors  thereof  appear  to  transact  most  of  their 
business  upon  the  doorstep.  The  inhabitants  are 
friendly,  especially  the  children.  But  most  welcome 


THE  EXILES  99 

sight  of  all,  wherever  we  march,  and  through  what- 
ever town  or  village  we  pass,  there  are  familiar 
greetings  awaiting  us,  in  the  form  of  signs  over 
doorways  or  at  street-corners,  thus  —  A.E.F.  Com- 
manding General's  Headquarters;  or,  To  A.P.M.'s 
Office:  or,  American  Red  Cross  Headquarters.  And  at 
each  street-crossing,  upright,  sunburned,  and  im- 
mensely alert,  stands  an  American  Military  Police- 
man, directing  the  tide  of  country  carts,  errant 
cows,  antediluvian  street-cars,  despatch-riders, 
motor-cycles,  and  marching  troops,  with  all  the 
solemn  austerity  of  a  New  York  Traffic  Cop. 

If  the  American  soldier  has  one  characteristic 
which  singles  him  out  from  the  rest  of  the  Allies,  it 
is  that  Home  is  seldom  absent  from  his  thoughts  — 
possibly  because  he  is  farther  away  from  home  than 
any  one  else.  It  is  true  that  more  water  rolls  be- 
tween, say,  France  and  Australia,  than  between 
France  and  America.  But  then  to  the  Australian 
England  itself  is  Home.  In  his  own  land  he  still  re- 
fers to  her  as  such.  The  true  exile  in  this  war  is  the 
American-born  Doughboy.  In  most  cases  he  has 
never  been  outside  his  own  great  and  beautiful  land 
before,  for  the  simple  reason  that  he  has  always 
found  abundant  elbow-room  therein;  and  if  the  de- 
sire to  roam  has  ever  possessed  him,  he  has  been 
able  to  gratify  it  without  stepping  off  the  soil  of  his 
country  or  even  beyond  the  border  of  his  own  State. 
Therein  he  is  in  different  case  from  the  inhabitants 
of  those  congested  islets.  Great  Britain  and  Ireland, 
many  of  whose  younger  sons  are  thrust  out  in  early 
Ufe  by  the  concomitant  forces  of  natural  increase 


100  THE  LAST  MILLION 

and  external  pressure  from  the  land  of  their  birth 
to  seek  a  living  in  distant  portions  of  the  globe  — 
and  in  so  doing  have  quite  inadvertently  created 
that  unmethodical,  loosely  connected  organization 
known  as  the  British  Empire,  which  is  either  a  fed- 
eration of  free  communities,  providing  decent  gov- 
ernment where  otherwise  there  would  be  no  govern- 
ment at  all,  or  else  a  voracious  octopus,  according 
to  the  way  you  look  at  it. 

But  the  American  soldier,  being  for  the  most  part 
famihar  with  no  country  but  his  own,  adapts  himself 
less  happily  to  foreign  conditions  than  Britons  who 
have  been  schooled  by  stern  necessity  to  make 
themselves  equally  comfortable  in  Wei-Hai-Wei  or 
Wigan.  Add  to  this  the  natural  outspoken  Ameri- 
can affection  for,  and  belief  in,  American  institu- 
tions and  mode  of  life,  and  you  will  understand  why 
American  troops  on  the  march  through  Europe  will 
cheer  themselves  hoarse  at  the  sight  of  such  re- 
minders of  Home  as  an  American  policeman  direct- 
ing the  trafhc  in  a  French  town,  or  an  imported 
American  locomotive  puffing  along  a  French  rail- 
road. 

And  there  is  one  other  American  institution  for 
which  the  American  soul  thirsts  in  this  barren  land 
—  the  American  newspaper.  Behold  us  billeted  for 
a  day  or  two  in  the  little  town  of  Crapaudville-sur- 
Loire.  Existence  there  is  a  series  of  queues.  In  the 
morning  we  arise  right  early  and  make  a  careful 
toilet.  For  this  purpose  we  form  a  queue,  or  water- 
line,  at  the  town  pump.  This  is  not  a  lengthy  busi- 
ness, because  it  does  not  take  long  to  fill  a  pannikin 


THE  EXILES  101 

with  water :  the  only  interruptions  which  occur  are 
due  to  natural  gallantry,  as  when  an  attractive 
Ally  arrives  to  fill  her  family  kettle.  After  that 
comes  breakfast-time,  which  entails  standing  in  an- 
other queue,  or  chow-line.  After  that  as  many  of  us 
as  can  contrive  to  do  so  hurry  off  to  stand  in  the 
most  important  queue  of  the  day  —  the  news-line. 
A  train  from  Paris,  of  arthritic  tendencies  and  ir- 
regular habits,  is  due  about  noon,  bearing  news- 
papers, which  are  doled  out  at  a  price  of  twenty- 
five  centimes. 

There  are,  of  course,  sharp  degrees  of  compari- 
son. The  great  Paris  morning  journals  are  nothing 
in  our  young  lives.  They  are  written  in  a  language 
which  we  do  not  know,  and  their  headlines  are  lack- 
ing in  enterprise.  The  Paris  issue  of  ^q  London  Daily 
Mail  is  better.  It  reaches  us  in  the  form  of  a  special 
American  edition,  which  caters  generously  to  our 
national  predilection  for  type  several  inches  high. 
But  beyond  that  it  does  not  go.  Blossom  and  blos- 
som and  blossom,  but  never  the  promise  of  fruit!  The 
reading  matter  below  the  headlines  is  constrained, 
lacking  in  pep  —  dead  stuff.  At  least,  so  Joe  Mc- 
Carthy says.  The  Paris  editions  of  the  New  York 
Herald  and  Chicago  Tribune  furnish  more  nom^ish- 
ment,  although  in  these  days  of  paper  famine  they 
are  sadly  attenuated  affairs  —  mere  single  sheets, 
sometimes.  Then  there  is  our  own  A.E.F.  weekly  — 
The  Stars  and  Stripes.  It  is  ably  conducted  and  full 
of  meat;  but  at  the  best  it  is  only  an  official  pubU- 
cation,  mainly  about  the  War.  And  it  was  not 
printed  in  America.  What  we  crave  for  is  home 


102  THE  LAST  MILLION 

news  —  home  gossip  —  home  advertisements.  A 
single  copy  of  an  American  Sunday  newspaper, 
with  comic  supplement  complete,  would  fetch  its 
weight  in  dollar  bills  over  here.  Our  spirits  yearn 
to  participate  once  more  in  the  Bringing  up  of 
Father,  or  the  fratricidal  rivalries  of  Mutt  and 
Jeff;  or  to  witness  the  perennial  discomfitures  of 
those  two  intensely  human  impostors,  Percy  and 
Ferdy.  Even  those  nasty  Uttle  Boche  abortions, 
the  Katzenjanamer  Kids,  would  be  something. 

The  happiest  man  is  he  who  receives  once  in  a 
while  a  copy  of  his  local  newspaper  from  home. 
These  come  rarely  enough,  for  second-class  mail 
matter  is  incurring  mysterious  casualties  these 
days. 

However,  one  of  these  priceless  packages  arrived 
not  long  ago  for  Eddie  Gillette,  all  the  way  from  a 
little  town  in  the  Northwest.  Eddie  tore  ofif  the 
wrapper,  and  almost  set  his  teeth  into  the  paper. 
Everything  was  there  for  which  his  soul  hungered 
—  news  about  America,  about  his  own  town,  about 
people  whom  he  knew  personally  —  conveyed  by 
means  of  the  arresting  headline,  the  pointed 
phrase,  and  the  intellectual  pemmican  of  the  heav- 
ily leaded  summary.  The  War  news,  of  course,  was 
weeks  old,  but  Ed  devoured  it  rapturously.  He 
knew  now  how  the  War  was  really  going. 

"This  guy  Allenby  must  be  some  dandy  fighter," 
he  observed  to  Al  Thompson,  looking  up. 

"Sure,  Ed!"  replied  Al  pleasantly.   "Why?" 

"He's  been  doing  fine  in  the  Holy  Land.  See 
what  it  says  here." 


THE  EXILES  103 

Ed  held  up  the  newspaper  for  Al  to  see,  and 
pointed  to  the  head  of  a  column: 

BRITISH  CRUSADERS  IN  NAZARETH 

ALLENBY  WINS  JESUS  CHRIST'S  HOME  TOWN 
FROM  TURKS 

"That's  the  goods!"  remarked  Ed  approvingly, 
as  he  folded  the  paper  with  reverent  care  and  tucked 
it  inside  his  shirt.  "The  feller  that  writes  that  stuff 
has  gotten  the  real  idea  for  a  story.  The  others 
over  here"  —  designating  apparently  the  editors 
of  the  London  Times  and  Paris  Matin  —  "ain't 
got  nothing  to  them.  No,  sir!  They  don't  write 
nothing  but  small-town  stuff!" 

"You  said  it,  Ed!"  agreed  Al. 

"All  the  same,"  observed  the  critic,  rising  and 
stretching  his  giant  limbs,  "this  yer  reading  the 
papers  from  home  may  give  a  feller  a  grand  and 
glorious  feeling,  but  it  makes  him  feel  mighty  lone- 
some and  homesick  too."  He  raised  a  pair  of  great 
fists  heavenward.  "Oh,  Boy  I  when  I  get  back 
home  after  this  War,  if  the  Statue  of  Liberty  ever 
wants  to  see  Ed  Gillette  again,  she'll  have  to  turn 
around  to  do  it! " 


CHAPTER  TEN 

S.O.S.  TO  DILLPICKLE 

To  most  of  us  hitherto  the  letters  S.O.S.  have  signi- 
fied calamity  of  some  kind  —  appeals  for  succour 
from  sinking  liners,  and  the  like.  Our  British  liai- 
son officers,  too,  tell  us  that  S.O.S.  is  the  epithet 
applied  to  the  rockets  which  are  always  kept  in  po- 
sition in  British  front-line  trenches,  to  be  discharged 
as  an  urgent  intimation  to  the  gunners  behind  that 
the  enemy  are  attacking  in  mass. 

But  in  the  American  Army  S.O.S.  means  "Serv- 
ice of  Supply,"  It  denotes,  not  panic,  but  order, 
and  control,  and  abundance.  It  covers  the  whole 
chainwork  of  activity  known  in  most  armies  as  the 
''Lines  of  Communication."  The  town  where  we 
find  ourselves  to-day  is  a  great  S.O.S.  centre.  On  its 
outskirts  lie  mushroom  cities  of  huts  and  sheds. 
Here  is  a  great  cold-storage  depot :  there  are  eight 
thousand  tons  of  frozen  beef  in  this  single  building. 
Here  is  a  big  station  for  assembling  aeroplanes, 
where  de  Haviland  planes  of  British  design  are 
being  fitted  with  Liberty  engines.  Through  the  town 
itself  there  flows  by  night  and  by  day  a  never-failing 
stream  of  food  and  munitions  and  replacement 
troops.  Needless  to  say  the  town  lies  upon  one  of 
the  main  roads  along  which  the  Race  to  Berlin  is 
being  run. 

Back  along  that  road,  alas!  streams  another 
current  —  a  counter-current  —  of  wastage,  mate- 


S.O.S.  TO  DILLPICKLE  105 

rial  and  human.  Upon  its  surface  is  borne  all  the 
dreadful  Utter  of  the  battle-field  —  rusty  rifles, 
damaged  equipment,  blood-soaked  uniforms.  Here 
is  a  mighty  depot,  which  handles  and  repairs 
such  wTeckage.  These  buildings  have  all  been  con- 
structed within  the  past  few  months.  It  would 
take  you  half  a  day  to  walk  through  them.  In  at 
one  end  of  the  establishment  goes  a  squalid  torrent 
of  torn  clothing,  unmated  shoes,  leaky  rubber 
trench  boots,  odds  and  ends  of  equipment.  In  due 
course,  after  a  drastic  series  of  laundering,  sorting, 
patching,  stitching,  or  vulcanizing  experiences  — 
mainly  at  the  hands  of  a  twittering  army  corps 
of  Frenchwomen  —  each  item  in  this  melancholy 
jumble  finds  itself  reincarnated  in  various  store- 
houses in  the  form  of  properly  assorted  pairs  of 
boots  and  shoes,  neat  second-hand  uniforms,  and 
complete  sets  of  equipment.  Nothing  is  wasted. 
Stetson  hats  damaged  beyond  repair  are  cut  up 
into  soles  for  hospital  slippers.  Uniforms  too  badly 
ripped  for  decent  renovation  are  patched,  dyed 
grass-green,  and  issued  to  German  prisoners. 

There  are  some  thousands  of  these  prisoners, 
with  more  coming.  WTien  they  arrive,  their  pre- 
vailing tint  is  grey.  Their  uniforms  are  grey,  by 
nature;  their  knee-high  boots  are  grey,  with  dust; 
their  faces  are  grey,  with  exhaustion  and  grime. 
These  human  derehcts  are  submitted  to  very 
much  the  same  process  of  restoration  as  the  dam- 
aged uniforms  and  equipment.  They  are  paraded, 
stripped,  and  marched  into  the  first  of  a  series  of 
renovation  chambers.  They  pass  under  hot  show- 


106  THE  LAST  MILLION 

ers;  they  spend  a  salutary  period  in  what  is  deli- 
cately described  as  the  "delousing  chamber";  they 
are  then  provided,  first  with  underwear,  then  with 
shoes,  then  with  one  of  the  grass-green  uniforms 
aforesaid,  and  finally  with  a  cooking  and  toilet  out- 
fit. They  are  shaved  and  their  hair  is  cut;  they 
are  medically  examined;  they  are  card-indexed;  a 
register  is  made  of  their  trades ;  they  are  housed  in 
comfortable  wooden  huts  within  a  great  barbed- 
wire  enclosure;  and  within  a  few  days  they  are  at 
work  upon  whatever  tasks  they  happen  to  be  best 
qualified  for,  earning  twenty  centimes  a  day.  They 
are  fed  upon  the  rations  of  American  and  British 
soldiers,  including  white  bread  —  the  only  white 
bread  in  Europe. 

Perhaps  some  of  them,  before  they  came  here, 
saw  the  Allied  prisoners  in  Germany  —  starved, 
robbed,  beaten,  and  forced  to  work  in  salt-mines 
or  shell-areas  until  death  made  an  end  of  their 
afflictions.  These  languishing  grass-green  captives 
must  bless  the  Geneva  Convention,  and  marvel  at 
the  uncultured  folk  who  still  stand  by  its  provisions. 

A  camp  of  German  prisoners  practically  runs 
itself.  Fritz  knows  when  he  is  well  off.  There  is  no 
insubordination.  Men  come  rigidly  to  attention 
when  an  officer  passes.  The  routine  work  is  super- 
vised by  German  sergeants.  In  this  particular 
camp  you  may  enter  one  large  hut  and  behold 
some  fifty  German  prisoners  engaged  upon  clerical 
work  connected  with  camp  administration  — 
ration  indents,  card-indexes,  and  the  like.  It  is  a 
task  after  the  German  heart.  Each  prisoner  is 


S.O.S.  TO  DILLPICKLE  107 

absorbed  in  his  occupation.  He  can  hardly  bring 
himself  to  rise  to  his  feet  when  the  door  is  thrown 
open  for  the  Officer  of  the  Day,  and  Achtung ! 
is  called.  His  pig's  eyes  gleam  contentedly  behind 
his  spectacles.  And  well  they  may!  A  German  de- 
livered from  the  German  Army  and  permitted  to 
sit  all  day  and  make  a  card  index  of  himself  may 
be  excused  for  imagining  that  he  has  got  as  near 
Heaven  as  a  German  is  ever  hkely  to  get. 

''When  this  War  is  over,"  observes  Mr.  Joe 
McCarthy,  gazing  meditatively  through  the 
barbed  wire,  'T  guess  someb'dy  will  have  to 
chase  these  ducks  back  to  Germany  with  a  gun!" 

Frenchwomen  are  not  the  only  representatives 
of  their  sex  in  the  American  Expeditionary  Force. 
There  are  hundreds  of  American  women  too,  from 
every  walk  of  American  life.  There  are  the  hospital 
nurses,  the  stenographers,  the  telephone  operators, 
the  motor-drivers  —  all  duly  enrolled  members  of 
the  Regular  Service.  Then  there  are  the  women  of 
the  Auxiliary  Forces  —  the  Red  Cross,  and  its 
sister  organizations  —  all  doing  a  man's  share, 
and  something  over.  Their  work  is  not  supposed, 
of  course,  to  take  them  up  into  the  battle  zone. 
They  serve  at  the  Base,  or  on  Lines  of  Commu- 
nication. But  in  these  days  of  Big  Berthas  and 
promiscuous  bombing  raids,  no  one  is  safe.  The 
battle  zone  is  the  extent  of  ground  which  an 
aeroplane  can  cover,  as  the  inhabitants  of  London 
know  to  their  cost.  Some  of  the  worst  devastation 
in  France  may  be  witnessed  at  certain  British  hos- 


108  THE  LAST  MILLION 

pital  bases  on  the  French  coast,  miles  from  any 
battle-hne. 

Still,  women  have  been  known  to  find  their  way 
into  the  Line.  As  some  student  of  nature  has  told 
us,  'Tt  is  hard  to  keep  a  squirrel  off  the  ground." 

One  summer  morning  an  old  acquaintance  of  ours, 
Miss  Frances  Lane,  and  her  crony,  or  accomplice, 
Miss  Helen  Ryker,  came  off  night  duty  at  their 
hospital  and  sniffed  the  fresh  air  luxuriously. 
They  had  twelve  hours  of  complete  freedom  from 
responsibility  before  them  —  a  circumstance  not 
in  itself  calculated  to  correct  Miss  Lane's  natural 
lightness  of  ballast. 

In  most  hospitals  nurses  coming  off  night  duty 
are  not  unreasonably  expected  to  spend  at  least 
some  portion  of  the  following  day  in  bed.  But  youth- 
ful vitahty,  abetted  by  summer  sunshine  and  a 
martial  atmosphere,  make  a  formidable  combina- 
tion against  the  forces  of  common  sense.  This 
particular  hospital  was  only  thirty  miles  from  the 
Line.  On  still  days  the  turmoil  of  the  guns  could 
be  heard  quite  plainly. 

After  breakfasting.  Miss  Lane  took  her  friend 
by  the  elbow  and  led  her  to  the  great  mihtary  map 
on  the  wall,  with  the  position  of  the  battle-Une 
clearly  defined  upon  it  by  an  irregular  frontier 
of  red  worsted,  and  said: 

"Helen,  listen!  Just  where  are  we  on  this  little 
old  map?" 

Miss  Ryker,  who  possessed  the  unusual  feminine 
accomplishment  of  being  able  to  read  maps  and 
railroad  time-tables,  laid  a  slender  finger-tip  upon 


S.O.S.  TO  DILLPICKLE  109 

the  blue  chalk-mark  which  designated  the  geo- 
graphical position  of  the  hospital. 

"There,"  she  said. 

"And,"  pursued  Miss  Lane,  in  a  low  voice, 
"where  do  we  go  from  here?" 

IVIiss  Ryker,  who  was  a  girl  of  few  words,  began 
to  measure  out  distances  with  her  finger  and  thumb. 

"The  nearest  point  to  us,"  she  announced  at 
last,  "is  a  place  called  Delficelles." 

"Delficelles?  Our  boys  captured  it  not  long  ago," 
said  Frances  in  confirmation.  "I  guess  the 
trenches  must  lie  just  beyond." 

On  one  point  she  was  right :  Delficelles  had  been 
captured  by  an  American  Division  a  fortnight 
previously.  On  the  other  she  was  wrong,  for  a 
reason  which  will  presently  appear. 

"We  are  going  to  visit  them,"  continued  Miss 
Lane. 

"How  do  we  get  there?"  enquired  her  practical 
friend. 

Miss  Lane  looked  stealthily  round,  as  a  pre- 
caution against  eavesdroppers.  Then  she  smiled 
seraphically. 

"I  guess  we  can  do  it  on  our  faces,"  she  re- 
marked. 

To  get  up  into  the  Line  —  that  tortured  strip 
of  territory,  some  five  miles  wide,  which  winds 
from  the  North  Sea  to  the  Alps,  and  within  which 
two  solid  walls  of  men  have  faced  one  another 
for  nearly  four  years  —  there  are  two  recognized 
courses  of  procedure.  One  is  to  be  a  member  of  an 


no  THE  LAST  MILLION 

armed  party  —  an  Infantry  Battalion,  say,  going 
up  to  take  over  a  sector  of  trenches.  There  is  no 
doubting  the  bona  fides  of  such  an  excursion. 

The  other  course  is  incumbent  upon  solitary 
individuals  hke  despatch-riders  and  unchaperoned 
civilians.  These  must  have  a  much-signed  and 
countersigned  pass.  Even  Staff  Officers  are  not 
exempt  from  this  law.  That  lesson  was  learned  as 
far  back  as  nineteen  fourteen,  when  German  offi- 
cers, arrayed  in  the  uniform  of  the  British  General 
Staff,  kindly  accompanied  the  British  Army  during 
the  retreat  from  Mons  and  added  to  the  already 
considerable  difficulties  of  a  hectic  situation  by 
directing  troops  down  wrong  roads  and  issuing 
orders  of  a  demoralizing  nature. 

So  now  it  is  almost  as  difficult  for  an  unauthor- 
ized person  to  get  into  the  fighting  area  as  into 
the  Royal  Yacht  Squadron,  or  the  New  York 
Subway  at  6  p.m.  Mesdames  Lane  and  Ryker 
were  obviously  neither  an  armed  party  nor  chap- 
eroned civilians.  But  young  and  attractive  females 
have  means  of  attaining  their  ends  which  are 
denied  to  the  rest  of  creation.  Ask  not  how  the  feat 
was  achieved.  Enquire  not  the  names  of  the  sus- 
ceptible lorry-drivers  who  succumbed,  nor  of  the 
tall  young  military  policeman  at  Dead  Dog  Corner 
who  melted  incontinently  beneath  the  appeal  of 
Miss  Lane's  blue  eyes.  Let  it  suffice  that  by  early 
afternoon  our  two  runagates  found  themselves 
safely  deposited  in  what  was  left  of  the  village  of 
Delficelles.  (By  the  way,  the  local  soldiery  pro- 
nounced it "  Dillpickle,"  so  we  will  let  it  go  at  that.) 


S.O.S.  TO  DILLPICKLE  111 

Having  reached  the  haven  of  then*  desire,  they 
found,  to  their  extreme  satisfaction  and  relief, 
that  it  seemed  to  be  no  part  of  any  one's  duty  to 
turn  them  out.  Indeed,  such  officers  as  they  en- 
countered punctiliously  saluted  their  uniform, 
while  the  rank  and  file  addressed  friendly  and 
appreciative  greetings  to  them.  One  enthusiast 
produced  a  pocket  camera,  and  insisted  upon  per- 
forming a  ceremony  which  he  described  as  ''spoil- 
ing a  film"  upon  the  precious  pair. 

The  village  itself  lay  in  a  hollow  behind  a  low 
ridge,  and  was  in  what  may  be  described  as  moder- 
ate ruins.  One  learns  to  make  these  distinctions 
in  the  shell-area.  Roughly,  there  are  three  grades. 
Villages  whose  roofs  are  riddled  by  shrapnel  and 
whose  windows  have  ceased  to  exist,  but  whose 
walls  are  still  standing,  may  be  regarded  as  prac- 
tically intact,  and  are  much  sought  after  as  places 
of  residence.  At  the  other  end  of  the  scale  come  the 
villages  which  were  dehberately  obliterated  by 
Brother  Boche  during  one  of  his  great  retreats. 
There  are  many  such  in  the  neighbourhood  of 
Bapaume  and  Peronne.  To-day  not  one  stone  of 
these  remains  upon  another.  Not  a  tree  is  to  be 
seen.  It  is  only  by  accepting  the  evidence  of  the 
map  that  you  are  able  to  realize  that  you  are  in 
a  village  at  all.  The  main  street  runs  between  high 
banks,  overgrown  by  weeds  and  nettles.  If  you 
part  these  and  look  underneath,  you  will  find  a 
subsoil  of  brick  rubble. 

At  the  cross-roads  in  the  centre,  where  once  the 
church  stood,  you  will  find  a  military  sign-board 


112  THE  LAST  MILLION 

giving  the  map-reference  of  the  village,  followed 
perhaps  by  a  postscript,  thus: 


Z.17.C.25. 

THIS  WAS 

VILLERS  CARBONNEL 


Fuit ! 

The  village  of  Dillpickle  occupied  an  inter- 
mediate position  between  these  two  extremes. 
Some  of  the  houses  were  standing;  others  were 
merely  a  pile  of  disintegrated  bricks  and  mortar. 
Where  one  of  these  ruins  had  overflowed  into  the 
street  and  obstructed  the  fairway,  the  debris  had 
been  cleared  away  and  built  up  into  a  neat  wall, 
guarding  the  sidewalk  from  further  irruption. 
Such  houses  as  still  stood  were  inhabited,  chiefly 
in  the  lower  regions,  by  American  artillerymen 
and  the  Infantry  Brigade  in  reserve.  The  village 
was  rich  in  German  notice-boards  —  black  stencil- 
ling on  plain  wood  —  announcing  that  here  was 
the  residence  of  the  Kommandant,  or  here  a  shelter 
from  bombardment  for  so  many  Manner,  or  that 
here  it  was  Verboten  for  the  common  herd  to  go. 
Most  of  these  were  now  pasted  over  with  notices 
and  orders  in  a  different,  and  healthier,  language. 

Our  friends  collected  a  German  notice-board 
apiece  as  a  souvenir,  and  proceeded  to  ransack 
the  village  for  further  booty.  Miss  Ryker,  who 
was  domestically  minded,  gleaned  two  forks,  a 
spoon,  and  some  cups  and  saucers.  Miss  Lane, 


S.O.S.  TO  DILLPICKLE  113 

caring  for  none  of  these  things,  appropriated  a 
small  mirror.  Presently  she  announced : 

"I  guess  we'll  go  up  to  the  trenches  now, 
Helen.  They  must  be  just  over  the  hill,  beyond 
that  wood  on  the  sky-Une." 

But  Miss  Lane,  as  already  noted,  was  wrong. 
The  trenches  did  not  lie  just  over  the  hill,  for  the 
very  good  reason  that  there  were  no  trenches.  We 
have  grown  so  accustomed  during  this  War  to  em- 
ploying "trenches"  as  a  synonjnn  for  "battle- 
line"  that  we  are  apt  to  overlook  the  fact  that  it  is 
possible  to  fight  upon  the  surface  of  the  earth.  For 
a  long  time  both  the  Allies  and  the  Hun  suffered 
from  a  disease  called  "Trenchitis,"  induced  by  an 
intensive  experience  of  high  explosive  and  machine- 
gun  bullets.  If  a  force  wished  to  defend  itself,  it 
produced  picks  and  shovels  and  dug  itself  in.  If  it 
wished  to  attack,  it  dug  an  advanced  "jumping- 
off"  trench  in  the  dead  of  night,  approached  by 
saps  and  tunnels,  and  so  made  the  open  space  to  be 
covered  in  the  assault  as  narrow  as  possible.  This 
is  a  useful  and  economical  way  of  fighting,  espe- 
cially when  your  troops  are  not  sufficiently  numer- 
ous to  warrant  prodigality.  But  it  wastes  much 
valuable  time;  and  since  the  day  when  the  entire 
American  Nation  was  placed  at  the  disposal  of  the 
AUies  as  a  reinforcement,  it  has  been  found  possi- 
ble to  employ  other  methods.  Down  South,  on  the 
Alsace-Lorraine  front,  where  a  lightly  held  outpost 
line  runs  for  more  than  a  hundred  miles  toward 
Belfort,  trench  warfare  is  still  fashionable.  But  in 
the  Argonne,  where  most  of  the  fighting  takes 


114  THE  LAST  MILLION 

place  in  closely  wooded  country,  we  remain  more 
or  less  above  ground,  maintaining  touch  with  one 
another  as  best  we  can  by  means  of  an  irregular 
chain  of  grass-pits  or  fortified  shell-craters. 

So  when  our  pair  of  truants  reached  the  wood  on 
the  sky-line,  and  penetrated  cautiously  to  the 
other  side,  they  beheld  no  trenches. 

At  their  feet  the  road  dropped  steeply  into  a  lit- 
tle valley,  filled  with  woods  which  ran  right  up  the 
slope  beyond  and  disappeared  into  a  smoky  mist 
on  the  opposite  crest.  The  sun  had  not  fulfilled  its 
early  promise,  and  had  disappeared  by  noon.  A 
small  drizzling  rain  was  beginning  to  fall. 

Helen  Ryker,  who  loved  her  personal  comforts, 
drew  her  blue  cloak  more  closely  round  her,  and 
shivered. 

''They  don't  have  any  trenches  /lere,"  she  an- 
nounced, in  aggrieved  tones. 

"They  are  in  the  woods  down  in  the  valley," 
Miss  Lane  assured  her.  "You  can  hear  the  firing." 

You  certainly  could.  Up  to  their  ears  from  the 
undergrowth  on  every  side  rose  the  mutterings  of 
warfare  —  solitary  rifle-shots,  and  the  intermittent 
pup-pupping  of  machine  guns.  Down  in  the  valley, 
at  the  foot  of  the  road,  they  could  see  a  stream. 
The  road  had  once  crossed  it  by  a  bridge;  but  the 
bridge  was  now  a  ruin,  and  the  road  had  been  di- 
verted so  as  to  cross  higher  up,  by  some  sort  of  pon- 
toon. 

Not  a  human  being  was  in  sight.  One  of  the 
strangest  characteristics  of  modern  warfare  — 
warfare  in  which  millions  of  men  are  employed 


S.O.S.  TO  DILLPICKLE  115 

where  formerly  hundreds  sufficed  —  is  the  entire 
invisibility  of  the  combatants.  In  these  days  of 
aeroplanes  and  magnifying  periscopes  no  man  ever 
makes  himself  more  conspicuous  than  need  be. 
A  hundred  years  ago  soldiers  went  into  action  in 
brightly  coloured  coats  and  flashing  accoutre- 
ments. Now  their  uniforms  imitate  the  colours  of 
nature  —  the  colours  of  grass  and  earth.  Guns  are 
painted  to  look  like  logs  of  wood.  If  a  sniper  wishes 
to  do  a  little  business  from  a  tree-top  or  a  thicket, 
he  not  infrequently  paints  himself  green  as  a  pre- 
liminary. 

"It's  lonesome  here!"  continued  Miss  Ryker. 

''I  expect  we  shall  find  the  boys  presently,"  re- 
pHed  the  undefeated  Frances.  "My  gracious, 
Helen,  what  was  that?" 

Over  their  heads  —  quite  close,  it  seemed  -^ 
sailed  something  invisible,  with  a  weary  sigh.  It 
was  a  howitzer  shell  fired  from  an  American  bat- 
tery five  miles  behind  them.  The  sound  of  its  pas- 
sage ceased,  but  almost  directly  afterward  a  column 
of  greenish-grey  smoke  spouted  up  from  the 
wooded  hillside  opposite,  followed  a  few  seconds 
later  by  a  heavy  detonation. 

Helen  and  Frances  found  themselves  unaffectedly 
gripping  hands. 

"What  is  it?"  asked  Helen  tremulously. 

One  of  Miss  Lane's  most  compelling  character- 
istics was  that  she  was  never  at  a  loss  for  an  answer. 

"That?  That's  artillery  fire,  I  guess.  That  over 
there  is  the  smoke  of  a  big  gun." 

As  usual,  she  was  partially  correct.  Wliat  they 


116  THE  LAST  MILLION 

saw  and  heard  was,  indeed,  artillery  fire,  but  it 
was  not  the  smoke  of  the  gun,  but  the  smoke  of 
the  shell  bursting  among  the  German  machine- 
gun  nests. 

"German  or  American?"  asked  Helen. 

"American,  sure.  Let's  go  on  down  this  road, 
and  see  some  more.  It's  a  nice  quiet  road.  There 
can't  be  any  danger." 

In  the  shell-area  on  the  Western  Front  the  fact 
that  a  road  is  quiet  does  not  by  any  means  guaran- 
tee that  it  is  "nice."  But  the  people  who  really 
enjoy  war  are  those  who  have  not  been  there  before. 
The  pair  of  adventurers  set  boldly  off  down  the  hill. 
As  they  started,  a  second  contribution  from  the 
howitzer  battery  passed  over  their  heads,  with  the 
lazy  rustle  which  characterizes  the  descent  of  high- 
angle  shells,  and  burst  in  the  woods  opposite,  fifty 
yards  to  the  right  of  the  first. 

"There's  another  gun  firing!"  exclaimed  Miss 
Lane,  clasping  her  hands  rapturously.  "My,  but 
I'm  excited!  C'm  along,  Helen!" 

They  hurried  down  the  road,  observing  with  a 
pleasant  thrill  that  the  surface  thereof  was  pitted 
with  shell-holes.  More  experienced  fire-eaters  would 
have  noted  that  some  of  these  holes  were  of  ex- 
tremely recent  origin  —  a  few  hours  old,  in  fact. 
Once  or  twice  they  paused  to  collect  more  souvenirs 
—  shell-fuses  and  empty  cartridge-cases. 

Distances  viewed  across  a  valley  are  deceptive, 
and  their  stroll  down  the  road  took  longer  than 
they  expected.  The  rain  was  coming  down  harder 
than  ever. 


S.O.S.  TO  DILLPICKLE  117 

"We  ought  to  hit  those  trenches  soon,"  said  Miss 

Lane. 

"What  are  trenches  like,  anyway?"  enquired 
Miss  Ryker,  a  httle  peevishly.  She  was  beginning  to 
make  heavy  weather  of  the  expedition  under  her 
cargo  of  crockery  and  expended  ammunition. 

Miss  Lane,  whose  acquaintance  with  trench  war- 
fare had  been  derived  mainly  from  the  Movies, 
made  no  reply.  She  had  stopped  by  the  roadside  to 
read  a  notice-board,  nailed  to  what  was  left  of  a 
tree.  It  said: 

This  road  must  not  be  used  by  troops  during  daylight. 

She  nodded  her  head  sagely. 

"That's  why  there  is  no  one  around,"  she  re- 
marked. "What  were  you  saying  just  now,  Helen?" 

Miss  Ryker  had  discovered  a  fresh  grievance. 

"It  seems  to  me  that  some  of  the  firing  has  gotten 
behind  us!"  she  said. 

The  girls  stood  still,  and  listened.  A  third  Amer- 
ican shell  swung  over  their  heads  and  burst  in  the 
woods  opposite.  Simultaneously  came  a  sharp  out- 
burst of  machine-gun  fire  from  the  right  —  the 
right  rear,  in  fact. 

"Maybe  we  have  walked  into  a  sort  of  bend  in 
the  line,"  suggested  Frances.  "They  call  it  a  sali- 
ent," she  added  professionally.  "Why,  if  there 
are  n't  some  of  our  boys  at  last!  There  .  .  .  crossing 
that  bridge!" 

She  was  right.  As  she  spoke,  two  khaki-clad  fig- 
ures emerged  from  the  woods  upon  the  opposite 
side  of  the  stream  below  them  and  trotted  briskly 


118  THE  LAST  MILLION 

across  the  pontoon  bridge,  in  single  file  a  few  yards 
apart.  Once  across,  they  joined  forces,  and  began 
to  climb  the  hill  in  a  more  leisurely  fashion.  But  it 
was  noticeable  that  instead  of  coming  up  the  road 
they  kept  a  course  roughly  parallel  to  its  direction 
—  perhaps  a  hundred  yards  away. 

''Why  should  they  go  hiking  through  that  mushy 
long  grass,  wetting  themselves,  when  there  is  a 
good  road  right  here?  Aren't  men  just  children?" 
observed  Miss  Ryker. 

''Perhaps  they  don't  know  about  the  road,"  said 
Miss  Lane  charitably,  "We'll  call  them.  Oh — 
Boys!" 

Her  syren  call  had  the  desired  effect  —  as  well 
it  might.  The  gentlemen  addressed,  both  of  whom 
were  labouring  up  the  slippery  slope  with  bent 
heads,  stopped  suddenly,  and  looked  about  them. 
Next  moment  they  were  doubling  heavily  through 
the  long  grass  in  the  direction  of  the  road,  making 
signals  as  they  ran.  They  appeared  agitated  about 
something. 

"Come  off  that  road!"  shouted  one  of  them,  who 
was  leading  by  ten  yards,  to  the  two  female  figures 
in  the  mist.  "Quittez  le  chemin!  Cest  dangereux! 
Beat  it  for  here!  Depechez-vous !  As  hard  as  you  — 
well  —  I'll  —  be — "  he  swallowed  something  — 
"  Frances  Lane  f  " 

With  a  final  bound,  Boone  Cruttenden,  with  a 
steel  helmet  on  his  head,  a  gas  apparatus  slung  on 
his  chest,  and  acute  fear  in  his  eyes,  landed  squarely 
in  the  ditch ;  then  scrambled  out  upon  the  road. 

"Why  — Boone?"  began  Frances  affably.  But, 


S.O.S.  TO  DILLPICKLE  119 

a  grasp  of  iron  fastened  on  her  arm  just  above  the 
elbow,  and  a  badly  frightened  young  man  pro- 
ceeded to  propel  her,  without  ceremony,  across  the 
ditch  and  away  from  the  road. 

"You  fetch  the  other  one,  Major!"  he  called 
over  his  shoulder. 

''I  shall  be  charmed,"  replied  an  unmistakable 
English  drawl. 

"Boone,  listen!"  protested  Miss  Lane  breath- 
lessly, as  she  was  towed  sideways  across  the  hill- 
side.  "What  are  you  —  ? " 

But  her  escort  merely  muttered  to  himself,  as 
they  ran : 

"Can  you  beat  it?  Can  you  heat  it?" 

Presently,  having  placed  a  distance  of  more  than 
a  hundred  yards  between  itself  and  the  road,  th<i' 
panting  convoy  was  permitted  to  halt. 

"We  will  now  continue  our  excursion  up  the 
hill,"  announced  the  English  Major.  "But  we  will 
keep  off  the  road,  if  you  ladies  don't  object.  It  is 
registered  from  top  to  bottom,  you  know." 

"Just  what  does  that  mean?"  enquired  Miss 
Lane,  whose  natural  curiosity  was  coming  back 
with  her  breath. 

"It  means,"  replied  the  Major,  removing  a  shin- 
ing monocle  from  his  right  eye  and  wiping  it  with 
a  khaki  handkerchief,  "that  the  Boche  has  the 
range  to  every  yard  of  it.  As  he  usually  searches 
it  with  H.E.  and  shrapnel  every  few  hours,  it  is 
healthier  to  keep  on  the  grass  when  going  up  and 
down  this  hill.  Are  we  far  enough  away  now,  do  you 
think,  Cruttenden?" 


120  THE  LAST  MILLION 


(i- 


'  Ye-es.  But  it  would  be  better  to  split  into  two 
parties,  I  should  say.  Less  conspicuous  —  eh?" 

The  Major  readjusted  his  monocle,  and  replied 
solemnly: 

*'  By  all  means.  This  young  lady  and  I  will  extend 
another  hundred  yards  to  the  left.  Cruttenden, 
considering  your  tender  years,  you  display  a  prom- 
ising acquaintance  with  tactics.  Also  diplomacy. 
So  long!" 

So  by  force  of  tactical  exigency,  Frances  Lane 
and  Boone  Cruttenden  walked  up  the  hillside  in 
the  rain  together.  Major  Floyd  and  Miss  Ryker 
were  discernible  in  the  failing  daylight,  keeping 
station  on  the  left  flank. 

"Now,  tell  me!"  Boone  and  Frances  began  to- 
gether. Then  they  stopped.  Boone  smiled. 

"Ladies  first!"  he  said. 

But  for  once  Frances  preferred  to  be  a  listener. 

"No,  Boone  Cruttenden  —  you!"  she  said.  "Tell 
me  what  you  are  doing  here,  anyway." 

"I  got  a  chance,"  explained  Boone,  "to  come 
here  with  Major  Floyd  —  he's  our  liaison  officer 
with  the  British  Mission  back  of  the  line  —  and 
have  a  look  at  this  sector.  The  regiment  may  take 
it  over  next  month.  The  Major  knows  the  ground, 
and  he  took  me  down  there"  —  he  pointed  back- 
wards over  his  shoulder  —  "to  see  our  advanced 
posts." 

"Where  are  the  trenches?" 

"Trenches?  There  are  none.  This  is  open  war- 
fare. The  Yanks  and  the  Huns  are  mixed  up  to- 
gether in  those  woods,  watching  one  another  like 


S.O.S.  TO  DILLPICKLE  121 

cat  and  dog.  We  hold  the  stream,  and  some  of  the 
ground  beyond.  That  pontoon  bridge  is  covered 
by  a  concealed  machine-gun  post  of  ours,  in  case 
the  Hun  tries  to  rush  it.  It's  probable  he  had 
direct  observation  on  it:  that  is  why  the  Major 
and  I  did  not  linger  much  as  we  came  across. 
We're  in  a  sort  of  pocket  here.  The  German  line 
bends  around  us.  Some  of  their  posts  up  in  the 
woods  have  a  clear  view  of  the  road,  all  the  way  up. 
Luckily  visibility  is  bad  to-day,  or  you  might  have 
been  spotted.  Now  tell  me  what  you  are  doing 
here!" 

Frances  told  him  —  as  much  as  she  thought 
he  need  know. 

''And  where  is  your  hospital  located?"  de- 
manded Boone. 

Miss  Lane  informed  him. 

"That  is  more  than  thirty  miles  back!"  cried 
Boone. 

"About  that,"  agreed  Miss  Lane  meekly. 

"  Does  any  one  know  you  are  here?  " 

"I  hope  not!  I  mean,  no  one  —  except  you, 
Boone,"  replied  Frances  softly. 

The  conscientious  Boone  made  a  last  efifort  to 
maintain  a  judicial  attitude. 

"Do  you  know  you  have  committed  a  serious 
military  offence?"  he  demanded  fiercely.  "Try- 
ing to  get  past  sentries,  and  trafiic  police!  Did 
you  know  that  no  women  are  allowed  anywhere  in 
the  battle  zone?" 

"Yes,"  said  Miss  Lane  demurely.  "That  was 
why  we  came  —  to  break  a  record!" 


122  THE  LAST  MILLION 

''And  do  you  know  that  all  this  valley  is  liable  to 
be  searched  with  gas,  and  you  have  no  gas-mask?" 

"I  did  n't  know  that,"  confessed  the  delinquent, 
"but  I  might  have  guessed  it,  I  suppose.  But  I  was 
dead  tired  of  that  old  hospital,  Boone,  and  I  was 
just  crazy  to  see  the  fighting!" 

''Crazy?  That's  just  the  word.  You  crazy, 
crazy  child!"  said  Boone  affectionately.  "Did  n't 
you  know  the  chances  you  were  taking?" 

"Yes,"  said  Frances  Lane.  "But"  —  her  eyes 
were  raised  to  his  for  one  devastating  moment  — 
"I  knew  I  was  safe  the  moment  I  saw  you,  Boone ! " 

"Oh,  Francie !"  murmured  that  utterly  demoral- 
ized youth. 


(C 


•And  where  are  your  headquarters  located, 
Major?"  enquired  Miss  Ryker  brightly.  The  con- 
versation had  harped  so  far  upon  her  own  mis- 
demeanours, and  she  was  anxious  to  introduce  a 
fresh  topic. 

"I  live  chiefly  with  the  Division  holding  this 
sector,"  replied  Major  Floyd.  "I  am  haison  officer." 

"Don't  drop  those  cups.  Just  what  does  a 
liaison  officer  do?" 

"I  act  as  bell-hop  between  the  local  British 
Mission  and  the  Americans.  I  go  around  paging 
Generals  and  Staff  Officers  —  and  everything," 
replied  the  Major. 

"There  are  no  Generals  here,"  Miss  Ryker 
pointed  out. 

"No.  To-day  I  am  having  a  vacation.  Boone 
Cruttenden's  Division  are  in  Corps  Reserve  near 


S.O.S.  TO  DILLPICKLE  123 

by,  so  I  undertook  to  bring  him  up  here  and  give 
him  his  first  view  of  the  Line." 

"How  did  you  get  here?"  enquired  Miss  Ryker, 
who  had  not  initiated  the  present  conversation  for 
nothing. 

"On  a  Staff  car." 

*' An  automobile?" 

"Yes." 

"Where  is  it?" 

"Behind  that  wood  at  the  top  of  the  hill." 

"Then,"  announced  Miss  Ryker,  coming  to  the 
point,  "you  will  be  able  to  give  us  two  poor  girls 
a  ride  home." 

"It's  —  it's  twenty-five  miles  out  of  our  way," 
said  Floyd  feebly.  "Besides,  Boone  and  I  have  our 
reputations  to  consider.  He  is  young,  and  might 
live  it  down,  but  think  of  me!  People  would  say 
I  was  old  enough  to  know  better." 

"Think  of  us!"  countered  Miss  Ryker;  "if  we 
can't  get  back,  and  the  Matron  finds  that  Frances 
and  I  have  been  playing  hookey!"  She  followed  up 
her  appeal  by  a  faint  sob. 

Major  Floyd  dropped  the  teacups  and  raised 
his  hands  above  his  head. 

"Kamerad!"  he  groaned. 

Whoo-oo-oo-oo-  UMP! 

A  long  overdue  shell  from  a  German  field  battery 
came  shrieking  over  the  tree-tops  behind  them 
and  landed  squarely  in  the  road,  two  hundred 
yards  to  their  right. 

"You're  quite  safe,"  announced  the  Major, 
patting  four  fingers  which  he  had  suddenly  dis- 


124  THE  LAST  MILLION 

covered  on  the  sleeve  of  his  Burberry.  "That  one 
is  too  far  away  to  hurt  us.  There  will  probably  be 
more,  but  Fritz  won't  shell  away  from  the  road. 
His  imagination  is  not  elastic." 

"What  about  Frances  and  Captain  Cruttenden?  " 
said  Helen.  "They  are  nearer  the  road  than  we  are. 
Would  that  shell  be  able  —  ?" 

Major  Floyd  rubbed  his  misty  monocle  and 
examined  the  two  figures  to  his  right. 

"They  don't  appear  to  have  heard  it,"  he  an- 
nounced, and  shook  his  head  mournfully. 


CHAPTER  ELEVEN 

THE  LINE 

Most  of  us  in  our  extreme  youth,  before  we  leave 
home  and  adventure  upon  the  Great  Unknown  of 
school  life  —  the  most  formidable  ordeal,  by  the 
way,  that  the  majority  of  us  ever  have  to  face  — 
endeavour  to  prepare  ourselves  for  what  we  imag- 
ine lies  before  us  by  a  course  of  study. 

We  devour  stories  about  schools  and  schoolboys, 
with  an  application  most  unusual  in  the  young.  We 
have  all  the  tenderfoot's  fear  of  being  considered  a 
tenderfoot,  so  we  take  pains  to  acquire  the  school- 
boy tone;  schoolboy  atmosphere;  schoolboy  slang. 
The  exploits  of  the  hero  after  he  becomes  "Cock 
of  the  School"  —  whatever  that  may  be  —  and 
leads  the  football  team  to  victory,  are  dismissed  by 
us  as  too  lofty  and  distant  for  our  achievement.  We 
are  much  more  interested  —  more  painfully  inter- 
ested —  in  his  experiences  as  a  freshman  or  fag. 
We  endeavour  to  pick  up  tips  as  to  what  a  boy 
entering  school  for  the  first  time  should  do,  and 
more  particularly  what  he  should  not  do,  in  order 
to  avoid  being  tossed  in  a  blanket  or  sent  to  Cov- 
entry, or  labelled  "sissy,"  or  "cry-baby"  —  and 
all  the  other  vague  terrors  which  have  kept  pro- 
spective Cocks  of  the  School  awake  at  night  since 
the  dawn  of  Education. 

This  intensive  course  of  self -preparation  has  one 
drawback.    None  of  the  things  described  in  the 


126  THE  LAST  MILLION 

books  ever  happen  at  the  school  to  which  we  are 
ultimately  sent.  We  have  plenty  of  surprises, 
plenty  of  rough  experiences;  but  none  quite  of  the 
kind  anticipated. 

American  soldiers,  arriving  on  the  Western 
Front  in  the  fourth  year  of  the  War,  feel  them- 
selves in  very  much  the  same  position  as  the  self- 
conscious  adventurer  described  above. 

Ever  since  —  in  some  cases,  before  —  our  coun- 
try came  in,  we  have  been  schooling  ourselves  for 
the  day  when  we  should  find  ourselves  Over  Here, 
among  veteran  soldiers.  Methods  have  varied,  of 
course.  Some  of  us  have  followed  every  turn  of  the 
operations  in  official  summaries  and  technical 
articles.  To  such,  the  War  has  been  a  glorified 
game,  we  will  say,  of  scientific  football.  Others  — 
Miss  Sissy  Smithers,  for  instance  —  have  educated 
themselves  upon  more  popular  lines  —  from  the 
Sunday  newspapers,  or  illustrated  magazines  of 
the  domestic  variety,  in  which  healthy  patriotism 
and  ''heart  interest"  are  not  fettered  by  any  petty 
considerations  of  technical  possibility. 

Over  here.  Disillusionment  awaits  both  these 
enthusiasts.  The  student  of  tactics  soon  reafizes 
the  difference  between  fighting  a  battle  in  imagi- 
nation and  in  reality.  Imagination  cannot  bring 
home  to  any  human  brain  the  extent  to  which  the 
chess-board  dispositions  of  modern  strategy  are 
tempered  by  the  actualities  of  modern  fighting  — 
in  other  words,  by  the  strain  upon  the  human  ma- 
chine. All  the  five  senses  are  affected  —  hearing, 
by  the  appalling  din;  seeing,  by  the  spectacle  of  a 


THE  LINE  127 

whole  group  of  human  beings  blown  to  shreds; 
smelling,  by  the  reek  of  gas  and  explosives;  touch- 
ing, by  the  feel  of  dead  men's  faces  everywhere 
under  your  hand  in  the  darkness;  and  tasting,  by 
the  unforgettable  flavour  of  meat  in  the  mouth 
after  forty-eight  hours'  continuous  fighting  in  an 
atmosphere  of  human  blood.  The  War  is  going  to 
be  won,  not  by  the  strategists,  but  by  the  man  who 
can  endure  these  things  most  steadfastly. 

Miss  Sissy  Smithers  need  not  be  taken  so  seri- 
ously. He  may  be  disappointed  at  first  to  find  that 
Red  Cross  nurses  follow  their  calling  in  Base 
Hospitals  and  not  in  No  Man's  Land;  and  that 
performing  dogs,  loaded  with  secret  despatches 
and  medical  comforts,  are  not  such  a  prominent 
feature  of  modern  warfare  as  the  lady  novelist 
would  have  us  believe.  But  no  enterprise,  however 
grim,  was  ever  the  worse  for  a  touch  of  glamour. 
Sissy  will  soon  settle  down. 

Still,  we  have  come  to  school  knowing  more  than 
most  new  boys  —  far  more,  indeed,  than  our  sea- 
soned French  and  British  companions  knew  when 
they  embarked  upon  their  martial  education.  The 
American  soldier  takes  the  field  to-day,  thanks  to 
the  recorded  experiences  of  others,  with  a  service- 
able knowledge  of  the  routine  of  trench  warfare. 
Gas  is  no  surprise  to  him,  and  he  is  familiar  with 
the  tactical  handling  of  bombs,  machine  guns,  and 
trench-mortars. 

Up  to  date,  however,  we  have  not  by  any  means 
drunk  deep  of  warlike  experience,  for  the  good 
reason  that  the  authorities  are  breaking  us  in  by 


128  THE  LAST  MILLION 

degrees.  We  are  now  in  trenches,  holding  what  is 
described  as  a  quiet  sector  of  the  Line,  recently- 
taken  over  from  the  French,  and  hitherto  very 
lightly  held. 

For  the  past  two  years,  the  Intelligence  people 
tell  us,  the  trenches  opposite  have  been  manned 
by  only  one  German  to  every  four  yards  of 
front.  Eddie  Gillette  has  already  announced  that 
when  he  has  finished  doing  what  he  came  out  here 
to  do  the  number  of  Germans  opposite  may  be  the 
same,  but  the  method  of  distribution  will  be  differ- 
ent. "Not  one  Dutchman  to  four  yards,"  he  ex- 
plains, "but  a  quarter  of  a  Dutchman  to  every 
one  yard.  Yes,  sir!" 

Every  Army  has  its  own  system  of  conducting 
trench  warfare,  founded  largely  upon  national 
characteristics.  The  Germans,  it  used  to  be  said, 
hold  their  trenches  with  machine  guns,  the  British 
with  men,  the  French  with  artillery.  Certainly  in 
nineteen-fifteen,  when  stationary  warfare  was  the 
order  of  the  day  upon  the  Western  Front,  the 
Germans  kept  few  men  in  the  front  trenches  — 
except  perhaps  at  night  —  leaving  the  line  very 
much  to  the  protection  of  barbed  wire  and  machine 
gims,  the  latter  laid  and  trained  in  such  a  fashion  as 
to  create  if  need  be  a  continuous  and  impenetrable 
horizontal  lattice-work  of  bullets  in  front  of  every 
section  of  the  line.  The  British,  having  at  that 
time  more  men  than  munitions  —  a  battalion  was 
lucky  if  it  possessed  four  Vickers  guns  and  a  single 
trench-mortar  —  filled  their  trenches  with  as  many- 
defenders  as  they  would  hold,  and  trusted,  not 


THE  LINE  129 

altogether  vainly,  to  the  old  British  tradition  of 
rapid  rifle  fire  and  close  work  with  the  bayonet 
to  keep  the  line  intact. 

The  French  temperament  called  for  more  elas- 
ticity than  this.  The  one  thing  a  Frenchman  hates 
to  do  in  warfare  is  keep  still.  He  prefers  active 
counter-measures  to  dogged  resistance.  So  in 
nineteen-fifteen,  whenever  a  sector  of  the  French 
trenches  was  heavily  bombarded,  the  garrison  was 
promptly  withdrawn  to  a  position  of  comparative 
safety  —  where,  the  story  goes,  they  seized  the 
opportunity  to  cook  an  extra-elaborate  dinner. 
If  the  Germans  followed  up  their  bombardment 
with  an  infantry  attack,  that  attack  was  met 
mainly  with  an  intensive  barrage  from  that  amaz- 
ingly rapid  and  accurate  piece  of  scrap-iron,  the 
soixante-quinze  field  gun.  When  the  German  attack 
fizzled  out,  as  it  usually  did,  the  incident  ended, 
and  the  French  infantry  returned  to  their  place  in 
the  line.  But  if  it  penetrated  the  barrage  and  occu- 
pied the  French  trenches,  the  Frenchman  finished 
his  cofTee,  adjusted  Rosalie,  his  bayonet,  and  prized 
Brother  Boche  out  of  his  new  quarters. 

But  all  that  was  in  nineteen-fifteen.  In  warfare 
your  best  teacher  is  your  opponent.  Nowadays  we 
have,  on  each  side  of  No  Man's  Land,  assimilated 
one  another's  methods.  Moreover,  trench  warfare 
of  to-day  has  developed  into  a  fluid  affair.  For  one 
thing,  trench-mortars,  tanks,  and  intensive  artil- 
lery bombardments  can  make  hay  of  the  most 
elaborate  defensive  works.  You  can  no  longer  sur- 
round yourself  with  barbed  wire  and  go  comfort- 


130  THE  LAST  MILLION 

ably  to  bed,  secure  in  the  knowledge  that  your 
opponent  cannot  possibly  get  at  you  without  a 
long  and  laborious  artillery  preparation.  In  nine- 
teen-sixteen,  before  the  First  Battle  of  the  Somme, 
British  and  French  guns  pounded  the  German 
trenches  night  and  day  for  three  weeks.  It  was  a 
great  pounding,  but  it  cannot  be  said  that  the  sub- 
sequent attack  came  as  a  surprise  to  the  enemy. 
Under  such  prolonged  and  pointed  attentions  even 
a  German  is  apt  to  suspect  that  something  is  in 
the  wind.  But  to-day  we  have  other  methods. 
Three  minutes  of  pandemonium  from  massed 
trench-mortars  —  a  rush  of  tanks  —  and  your 
defences  are  gone  and  the  Philistine  is  upon  you. 

So  in  nineteen-eighteen  we  live  perpetually  upon 
the  qui  vive,  and  our  methods  have  been  elaborated 
and  standardized  to  the  common  measure  of  our 
joint  experience.  Our  artillery  has  the  whole  front 
registered.  At  a  given  signal  it  can  let  down  a  bar- 
rage —  a  Niagara  of  shrapnel  and  high-explosive 
—  upon  the  strip  of  earth  that  separates  the 
enemy's  front  line  from  our  own.  This  can  be  sta- 
tionary, to  annihilate  an  enemy  attack,  or  ''creep- 
ing," to  form  a  protective  screen  for  an  attack  of 
our  own.  We  have  machine  guns  too,  set,  d  la 
Boche,  at  fixed  angles  to  maintain  a  continuous 
band  of  fire  along  each  line  of  our  trenches  — 
more  especially  along  the  second  line;  for  it  is  a 
waste  of  life  and  energy  to-day  to  treat  the  front 
trench  as  anything  more  than  a  close  chain  of  out- 
posts, screening  the  real  dispositions  behind. 

And  the  rifle  and  bayonet  have  come  back  to 


THE  LINE  131 

their  own.  Two  years  ago  they  were  in  danger  of 
being  discarded  as  obsolete.  Every  one  was  bomb 
mad.  It  was  claimed  that  a  rifle  and  bayonet  are 
useless  against  an  experienced  opponent  feeling 
his  way  along  a  zigzag  trench  in  your  direction. 
True ;  but  a  bomb  is  equally  useless  —  or  rather, 
equally  dangerous  —  in  the  presence  of  an  oppo- 
nent rushing  upon  you  in  the  open.  So  now  we  have 
adjusted  our  perspectives,  and  each  device  of  war 
is  put  to  its  proper  use. 

So  much  for  what  the  author  of  that  little  classic, 
''Dere  Mable,"  would  describe  as  "Tecknickle 
stuff." 

Needless  to  say,  we  are  burning  to  play  with  all 
these  new  toys  simultaneously,  like  a  small  boy  on 
Christmas  morning.  But  we  have  had  little  oppor- 
tunity so  far.  To  vary  the  metaphor,  we  must  eat 
up  our  bread  and  butter  before  we  are  allowed  cake. 
We  are  busy  at  present  learning  trench  routine. 
Taking  over  trenches  from  another  unit,  for  in- 
stance. This  is  a  complicated  and  exasperating  pas- 
time. It  usually  has  to  be  performed  in  the  dark; 
otherwise  enemy  aeroplanes  might  observe  un- 
usual activity  behind  our  line,  and  advise  their 
artillery  to  that  effect.  This  involves  much  night- 
marching  along  roads  pitted  with  shell-holes;  and 
the  trouble  about  a  shell-hole  three  feet  deep  is 
that  in  wet  weather  it  looks  like  a  perfectly  inno- 
cent puddle.  Frequently,  to  avoid  congested  wheel 
traffic,  we  have  to  march  across  country  in  single 
file,  under  the  leadership  of  a  faltering  guide.  Not 
a  light  must  be  shown,  not  a  word  spoken.  Each 


132  THE  LAST  MILLION 

man,  loaded  with  rifle,  equipment,  gas  apparatus, 
and  a  few  extra  and  imauthorized  comforts,  has  to 
follow  the  ghostly  form  of  the  man  immediately 
in  front  of  him.  It  is  discouraging  work,  for  the  sim- 
ple reason  that  if  you  set  one  hundred  men  to 
march  in  single  file  in  the  dark,  though  the  leader 
may  be  groping  his  way  forward  at  the  rate  of 
one  mile  per  hour,  the  last  man  in  the  queue  is 
always  running,  and  has  to  run  if  he  is  not  to  be  left 
behind.  No  one  knows  why  this  should  be  so,  but 
the  uncanny  fact  remains. 

Once  you  have  descended  into  the  communica- 
tion trenches  it  is  less  easy  to  lose  yourself  —  unless 
the  guide  sets  the  example  —  but  your  progress 
becomes  slower  than  ever.   Possibly  —  probably 

—  you  meet  a  procession  going  in  the  opposite 
direction  —  a  ration-party,  maybe,  or  stretcher- 
bearers  with  their  patient,  cheery  freight.  The 
fact  that  they  have  no  right  to  be  there  at  all 

—  practically  all  communication-trenches  here  are 
supposed  to  be  one-way  thoroughfares  —  makes 
matters  no  easier,  though  it  affords  relief  in  the 
form  of  argumentative  profanity  as  you  struggle  to- 
gether in  the  constricted  fairway  like  stout  ma- 
trons loaded  with  market-produce  in  a  street-car. 

Arrived  in  the  actual  trenches,  the  congestion  is 
even  greater,  for  now  there  are  just  twice  as  many 
men  in  the  trench  as  it  was  constructed  to  hold, 
and  the  outgoing  party  must  never  budge  until 
the  incoming  party  have  arrived  and  ''taken  over." 
Taking  over  is  no  mere  formality  either.  Officers, 
machine-gunners,  bombers,  chemical  experts,  and 


THE  LINE  133 

other  specialists  must  seek  out  their  "opposite 
numbers"  in  the  gross  darkness  and  take  receipt 
in  due  form  of  ammunition,  observation-posts, 
gas-alarms,  and  situation  reports,  amid  the  crack- 
ling of  rifle-fire  and  the  sputtering  of  the  illuminat- 
ing flares. 

At  last  the  relief  is  complete.  The  word  is  passed 
along.  The  outgoing  unit,  after  communicating 
sundry  items  of  information  as  to  the  habits 
and  customs  —  mostly  unpleasant  —  of  the  local 
Boche,  coupled  with  sundry  warnings  as  to  his 
favourite  targets  and  own  tender  spots,  fades 
away  down  the  communication-trenches,  with 
whispered  expressions  of  good-will  —  and  you  are 
left  alone,  wondering  what  would  happen  if  the 
enemy  were  to  make  a  surprise  attack  now. 

Trench  life  is  never  comfortable  at  any  time,  but 
the  first  night  in  a  strange  trench  is  the  most 
uncomfortable  of  all.  For  one  thing,  the  trench 
feels  unnaturally  crowded.  Moreover, we  are  young 
troops  —  the  youngest  troops  in  the  world  to-day 
—  and  that  means  much.  We  have  no  Mnlvaneys 
or  Learoyds  among  us.  If  we  had,  we  should  be 
taught  a  number  of  things  —  how  to  boil  a  canteen 
over  a  couple  of  glowing  chips;  how  to  hollow  out 
a  bed  in  hard  soil;  where  to  find  water  in  an  ap- 
parently dry  trench  —  trifles  small  in  themselves, 
but  making  all  the  difference  between  misery  and 
comfort. 

But  that  by  the  way.  With  daylight  comes  a  new 
spirit  —  or  rather,  the  old  spirit  —  of  confidence. 
Eager  persons  peer  over  the  parapet,  to  observe 


134  THE  LAST  MILLION 

where  the  enemy  is,  and  what  he  is  like.  They  see 
httle  enough.  Two  hundred  yards  away  an  irregu- 
lar ripple  of  sandbags — some  white,  some  black  — 
looking  like  a  dirty  wave-crest  on  a  brown  sea, 
marks  the  position  of  the  German  fire-trenches. 
This  mixture  of  colours  is  thoughtful.  If  the  sand- 
bags were  all  of  one  tint,  like  our  own,  loopholes 
would  be  hard  to  conceal :  under  the  German  sys- 
tem, you  never  know  at  a  distance  whether  you 
are  looking  at  a  loophole  or  merely  a  black  sandbag. 
The  intervening  space  is  a  wilderness  of  shell-holes, 
splintered  tree-stumps,  and  rusty  barbed  wire. 
Further  observation  is  cut  short  by  a  sniper's 
bullet,  which  travels  past  enquiring  heads  with  a 
vicious  crack.  We  have  learned  our  first  lesson. 
In  trench  warfare,  by  daylight  at  least,  curiosity 
must  be  satisfied  through  peepholes  or  periscopes. 
In  the  trench  itself  there  is  plenty  to  occupy  us. 
There  are  watches  to  be  kept  and  manual  work  to 
be  done.  A  trench  system  is  eternally  throwing  out 
annexes  and  undergoing  repairs,  for  the  artillery 
on  the  other  side  is  always  busy.  There  are  supplies 
to  be  brought  up.  There  is  cooking  to  be  done:  that 
occupies  much  time,  for  firing-trenches  to-day  are 
equipped,  like  the  fashionable  lady's  vanity-bag, 
with  everything  except  the  kitchen  stove.  And  no 
bad  thing  either.  Trench  life  has  been  described 
by  competent  authorities  as  ''Weeks  of  Monotony 
tempered  by  Half-Hours  of  Hell."  Nothing  dispels 
monotony  like  the  necessity  of  practising  the  prim- 
itive domestic  virtues.  At  home  we  hire  expensive 
menials  —  or  expect  our  wives  —  to  Ught  our  fires 


THE  LINE  135 

and  cook  our  dinners,  because  we  are  too  busy  or 
too  civilized  to  do  it  ourselves.  Over  here  we  like 
doing  it,  because  it  is  our  actual  instinct  to  do  so, 
and  also  passes  the  time. 

As  for  the  Half -Hours  of  Hell,  these  mainly  take 
the  form  of  short,  furious  bombardments  and  mid- 
night raids.  But  the  German  artillery  is  not  very 
busy  in  this  sector.  Guns,  and  more  guns,  are  ur- 
gently required  farther  north,  where  the  Allied 
line,  after  stretching  back  and  back  during  those 
anxious  days  in  the  spring  of  the  year,  has  now 
reacted  like  a  released  bowstring  and  has  shot 
the  Boche  back  to  the  Meuse. 

So  far  as  we  can  gather  from  the  sources  at  our 
disposal  —  official   bulletins,    intermittent   news- 
papers, and  trench  gossip  (personified  ha  the  Amer- 
ican Expeditionary  Force  by  a  supposititious  in- 
dividual of  great  erudition  but  small  reliability, 
whose  Christian  name  is  ''Joe")  — our  cause  is 
prospering  from  the  North  Sea  to  the  Alps.  Ger- 
many shot  her  bolt  with  her  third  great  offensive 
on  the  twenty-seventh  of  May,  when  German  arms 
once  more  crossed  the  Marne  and  penetrated  to 
within  twenty-eight  miles  of  Paris.  There  they  were 
stayed,  in  a  battle  where  at  least  one  third  of  the 
Alhed  troops  were  American,  and  where  the  young 
American  Army  got  its  first  real  chance,  and  took 
it.  In  this  operation  the  Second  and  Third  Ameri- 
can Divisions  were  sent  to  stiffen  the  French  fine. 
Of  these,  the  Third  successfully  held  a  vital  bridge- 
head opposite  Chateau  Thierry:  the  Second  cap- 
tured Bouresches,  Belleau  Wood,  and  Vaux. 


136  THE  LAST  MILLION 

So  much  we  know  for  certain,  for  these  things 
happened  before  we  left  England,  and  official 
information  was  available.  The  work  of  the  Ma- 
rines, in  the  Second  Division,  has  already  passed 
into  American  history.  But  for  news  of  subsequent 
happenings  we  have  had  to  depend  too  much  upon 
our  friend  Joe.  All  we  know  for  certain  is  that  on  the 
fifteenth  of  July  the  enemy  launched  just  one  more 
offensive  —  his  fourth  and  as  it  proved,  his  very 
last.  This  time,  so  far  as  we  can  gather,  the  Allies, 
instead  of  contenting  themselves  with  defensive 
tactics,  took  the  business  into  their  own  hands  and 
bit  suddenly  and  deeply  into  the  side  of  the  huge, 
distended,  pocketful  of  Germans  which  hung  down 
from  Soissons  over  Paris.  The  pocket  promptly 
contracted  itself:  the  enemy  disgorged  himself 
from  its  mouth,  and  began  to  retreat.  From  all 
accounts  he  has  been  retreating  ever  since. 

French,  British,  and  American  troops  were  all 
engaged  in  this,  the  final  and  triumphant  redress- 
ing of  the  balance.  And  each  were  represented  by 
their  best.  One  of  our  liaison  officers  tells  us  of  a 
memorial  set  up  by  French  soldiers  in  honour 
of  the  dead  of  the  famous  Fifty-first  Division  of 
the  British  Army  —  the  Highland  Territorials  — 
and  of  an  inscription  carved  thereon  which  pro- 
claimed that  hereafter  the  Thistle  of  Scotland 
would  forever  flourish  beside  the  Lilies  of  France. 
In  that  great  fi.ght  not  merely  unity  of  command, 
but  unity  of  sentiment,  seem  to  have  come  to  their 
own  at  last. 

The  Allied  counter-attack  struck  deep  along  the 


THE  LINE  137 

whole  line.  Soissons  and  Montdidier,  we  hear,  are 
once  more  in  our  hands;  while  farther  north,  in 
Flanders,  the  British  Third  and  Fourth  Armies 
are  sweeping  forward  for  the  last  time  in  the  blood- 
soaked  valley  of  the  Lys. 

As  for  the  American  share,  we  have  not  heard 
too  much,  but  what  we  have  heard  is  enough  to 
make  us  tingle.  We  hear  of  great  work  by  the 
Regulars  of  the  First,  Second,  and  Third  Divisions; 
by  the  Twenty-sixth  —  the  Yankees  of  New  Eng- 
land—  and  by  the  Forty-second  Rainbow  Divi- 
sion, from  Yaphank.  It  is  also  reported  that  other 
American  Divisions  made  no  small  impression 
upon  Brother  Boche  —  the  Fourth,  the  Twenty- 
eighth;  the  Thirty-second,  and  the  Seventy- 
seventh. 

The  Twenty-seventh  and  Thirtieth,  we  under- 
stand, are  somewhere  with  the  British  opposite 
the  Hindenburg  Line  near  Cambrai.  Doubtless 
we  shall  hear  something  of  them  too,  in  due  course. 
Great  days,  great  days!  But  to  what  a  fever  of 
exasperation  are  we  aroused,  who  are  not  there 
ourselves ! 


CHAPTER  TWELVE 

CHASING  MONOTONY 

At  present  the  authorities  are  engaged  in  impress- 
ing upon  us  the  truth  of  the  maxim  which  says  that 
you  must  not  run  before  you  can  walk.  Our  imme- 
diate duty  is  to  show  that  we  can  stand  the  test 
of  ordinary  trench  warfare. 

First,  such  every-day  nuisances  as  the  German 
sniper.  And  here  we  have  a  pleasant  little  success 
to  record. 

When  we  took  over  these  trenches,  snipers  were 
nimierous  and  vigilant.  If  you  raised  your  head 
above  the  parapet,  one  of  two  things  happened. 
Either  you  heard  a  sound  like  the  crack  of  a  whip- 
lash close  to  your  ear;  or  you  did  not.  If  you  did, 
you  were  lucky.  If  you  did  not,  you  were  buried  at 
dusk. 

There  is  one  piece  of  slightly  rising  ground  in  the 
enemy's  line  which  commands  an  oblique  view 
of  a  stretch  of  our  front  trenches.  For  a  week  we 
have  been  pestered  by  a  sniper  concealed  some- 
where along  this  eminence,  about  three  hundred 
yards  away,  on  our  right  front.  We  have  scrutin- 
ized its  whole  expanse  with  periscopes  and  through 
loopholes,  but  there  is  no  sign  of  trench  or  em- 
placement where  the  sniper  might  be  concealed. 

Yesterday  that  untutored  but  resourceful  fire- 
eater,  Eddie  Gillette,  turned  his  attention  to  the 
matter,  the  urgency  of  which  had  been  impressed 


CHASING  MONOTONY  139 

upon  him  by  the  fact  that  a  sniper's  bullet,  travel- 
ling side  wise  down  the  trench,  had  chipped  a 
groove  in  Eddie's  own  "tin  derby"  that  very 
morning,  Eddie's  head  being  inside  at  the  time. 

"We  got  to  locate  that  lobster,"  he  observed. 
And  he  did. 

In  a  field  behind  the  support  line  there  grows,  or 
rather,  rots,  a  crop  of  derelict  and  much-bom- 
barded turnips.  Last  night  Eddie,  after  a  confer- 
ence with  his  officer,  Boone  Cruttenden,  and  the 
top  machine-gun  sergeant,  disappeared  for  an  hour 
into  the  hinterland,  and  brought  back  with  him  an 
armful  of  selected  esculents.  The  largest  of  these 
he  proceeded  this  morning  to  spear  upon  a  flat  lath 
of  wood.  Upon  the  top  of  this  eminence  he  perched 
his  own  steel  helmet,  at  a  jaunty  angle.  Attended 
by  a  respectfully  interested  cohort  of  disciples,  or 
rubbernecks,  he  next  selected  a  suitable  spot  in 
the  front-line  trench,  and  with  the  help  of  a  length 
of  rope  and  a  little  ingenuity  succeeded  in  lashing 
the  turnip-laden  lath  to  the  revetment  of  the  para- 
pet in  such  a  fashion  as  to  make  it  possible  to  slide 
the  lath  up  and  down. 

It  was  a  still,  sunny,  September  morning,  and 
the  whole  line  was  quiet,  except  for  an  occasional 
rifle-shot,  and  the  intermittent  boom  of  artillery 
beyond  the  next  hill-crest  to  the  south.  Eddie's 
preliminary  adjustments  were  barely  completed 
when  Boone  Cruttenden  arrived,  carrying  a  peri- 
scope and  attended  by  the  machine-gun  sergeant. 

"Got  everything  fixed,  Gillette?"  enquired 
Boone. 


140  THE  LAST  MILLION 

"Yes,  sir,''  replied  Eddie,  ignoring  the  cynical 
smiles  of  Joe  McCarthy,  who  was  present  in  the 
capacity  of  dramatic  critic. 

''Right,"  said  Boone.  ''Go  to  it!" 

The  inventor  cautiously  slid  the  lath  up  in  its 
groove,  until  the  helmet-crowned  turnip  stood 
some  six  inches  above  the  parapet,  offering  a 
goodly  mark  against  the  sky.  Then  crouching 
down,  he  waited.  The  spectators,  with  remarkable 
unanimity,  followed  his  example. 

Crack ! 

A  bullet  shaved  the  top  sandbag  and  buried  itself 
with  a  vicious  thud  in  the  back  wall  of  the  trench. 

"Missed!"  announced  Gillette  calmly.  "We 
better  let  him  try  again." 

"Lower  the  turnip  a  couple  of  minutes  first," 
advised  Boone.  "A  real  man  would  n't  keep  his 
head  up  there  all  the  time  —  unless  it  was  a  bone 
one!" 

Gillette  complied,  and  waited. 

"What's  the  big  idea,  Ed?"  enquired  Al 
Thompson  respectfully. 

"The  big  idea,"  replied  Eddie,  "is  first  of  all  to 
let  that  Dutchman  over  there  drill  a  hole  in  this 
turnip.  Then,  if  we  peek  through  the  hole,  we  shall 
be  looking  along  the  track  of  the  bullet  —  at  this 
range  it  would  travel  on  a  pretty-nigh  flat  line  ^ 
and  we  shall  see  the  exact  place  the  bullet  started 
from,  which  is  what  we  are  after.  In  case  we  don't 
get  the  exact  location,  we  will  put  up  another  tur- 
nip some  other  place  in  the  trench,  and  get  a  cross- 
bearing  from  that.  That's  the  big  idea,  boys!" 


CHASING  MONOTONY  141 

''And  who,"  enquired  the  grating  voice  of  Mr. 
Joe  McCarthy,  "is  the  poor  fish  who's  gonna  put 
his  bean  up  above  the  parapet  and  peek  through 
the  hole?" 

Eddie  Gillette  forbore  to  reply,  but  resumed  his 
operations  with  added  dignity,  sliding  his  turnip- 
head  once  more  into  the  enemy's  view.  There 
was  another  crack,  and  the  steel  helmet  oscillated 
sharply. 

"Right  through  the  nose!"  announced  Eddie, 
with  ghoulish  satisfaction.  "Now,  Captain  — 
quick!" 

Already  Boone  Cruttenden,  crouching  low,  was 
applying  his  periscope  to  the  hole  in  the  back  of 
the  turnip.  The  machine-gun  sergeant,  stationed 
at  a  tiny  observation  loophole  in  a  steel  plate  close 
by,  waited  eagerly  for  instructions. 

Boone,  with  his  magnifying  periscope,  took  a 
rapid  observation  of  the  constricted  field  of  view 
afforded  by  the  narrow  tunnel  through  the  turnip; 
then  another,  over  the  open  parapet  this  time; 
then  another,  through  the  turnip  again.  He  spoke 
rapidly. 

"Sergeant,  do  you  see  two  stunted  willows  on  the 
sky-line,  half-right?" 

"Yes,  SU-." 

"Below  them,  a  single  small  bush?" 

"Yes,  su-.  I  got  it." 

"Well,  lay  a  machine  gun  to  cover  the  ground 
about  five  yards  to  the  right  of  that.  Call  the  range 
three-fifty.  I  guess  he  is  somewhere  around  there. 
I  can't  see  any  loophole  or  anything,  but  maybe 


142  THE  LAST  MILLION 

he  is  lying  right  out  in  the  open,  covered  in  grass, 
or  —  " 

Crack!  The  conscientious  artist  over  the  way  was 
growing  restive  at  his  own  want  of  success.  This 
time  he  chipped  the  top  of  the  steel  helmet. 

"That  will  do/'  said  Boone.  "Lower  away  that 
turnip,  Gillette,  and  we'll  take  a  second  bearing 
farther  along." 

Mr.  Gillette  collected  his  paraphernalia  with  the 
solemn  dignity  of  an  acolyte  taking  part  in  a  mys- 
tery. But  he  unbent  to  human  level  for  a  moment. 

"You  see,"  he  observed  caustically,  "we  don't 
require  no  poor  fish  here,  Joe  McCarthy!" 

In  due  course  a  second  turnip  was  hoisted  and 
perforated,  a  second  bearing  taken,  and  another 
machine  gun  laid.  The  machine-gun  teams  took 
station;  the  first  cartridges  were  fed  into  the 
chambers. 

"Let  'em  go  the  moment  he  snipes  again,"  was 
Boone's  order. 

A  third  spot  was  selected,  and  a  third  turnip 
exposed.  This  time  it  wagged  itself  provokingly, 
and  the  sniper  responded  at  once.  It  was  a  beau- 
tiful shot,  but  it  was  his  last.  Next  moment  two 
converging  streams  of  machine-gun  bullets  were 
spattering  his  lair.  What  happened  we  shall  never 
know,  but  we  were  never  again  troubled  from  that 
particular  locality. 

"We  certainly  got  to  hand  it  to  you,  Ed,"  an- 
nounced Joe  McCarthy,  in  an  unusual  fit  of  self- 
abasement. 

Next,  artillery  fire.  The  Boche  bombards  our 


CHASING  MONOTONY  143 

trenches  twice  a  day,  and  searches  the  back  areas 
with  shrapnel  at  night.  He  is  not  very  persistent, 
and  a  httle  sharp  retaliation  from  our  gunners 
usually  brings  his  performance  to  a  conclusion. 
Still,  it  is  unpleasant  while  it  lasts. 

To  be  shelled  for  the  first  time  must  fairly  rank 
with  the  j&rst  cigarette,  the  first  shave,  and  the  first 
kiss  as  one  of  the  unforgettable  experiences  of  life. 
Opinions  vary  as  to  the  best  place  to  be  during  a 
bombardment  —  assuming  that  one  has  to  be  any- 
where at  all.  Jim  Nichols  considers  a  shell-hole 
a  good  place. 

"It  is  well  known,"  he  points  out,  ''that  no  two 
bullets  ever  hit  the  same  spot.  Nelson,  or  some 
other  historical  gink,  once  said  that  the  safest  place 
for  a  man  to  put  his  head  during  a  sea-fight  was 
a  hole  made  in  a  ship's  side  by  a  cannon-ball.  Me 
for  a  shell-hole,  every  time!" 

Boone  Cruttenden  thinks  an  ordinary  trench 
dugout  would  be  best.  Else  what  are  dugouts  for  ? 

"It  depends  on  who  made  them,"  replies  the 
veteran  Major  Powers.  "The  German  officer's  idea 
is  all  right.  He  turns  on  a  squad  of  men,  and  they 
construct  for  him  a  combined  club  and  restaurant 
somewhere  near  the  centre  of  the  earth.  But  even 
that  is  liable  to  have  its  exits  blocked.  Personally, 
if  I  were  under  bombardment,  I  should  stay  out 
in  the  trench.  I  am  more  likely  to  be  hit,  but  less 
likely  to  be  buried;  and  I  don't  intend  to  go  putting 
the  cart  before  the  horse  at  my  funeral!" 

All  had  an  opportunity  to  test  their  theories  — 
and  their  nerve  —  the  first  afternoon  after  taking 


144  THE  LAST  MILLION 

over  the  trenches.  Boone  and  Jim  shared  a  dugout 
in  the  front  Une,  sunk  below  the  forward  parapet, 
under  the  sandbags.  Having  contracted  the  British 
habit  of  afternoon  tea,  they  were  occupied  towards 
five  o'clock  in  brewing  that  beverage  in  a  mess-tin, 
when  suddenly,  with  a  whizz  and  a  rush,  a  German 
shell  passed  over  the  trench  and  burst  amid  a  cloud 
of  flying  clods  fifty  yards  beyond  it. 

"This  is  the  afternoon  bombardment  that  we 
w^re  warned  about,"  said  Jim,  pouring  out  two  cups 
of  tea.  ''Now  we  shall  know  whether  we  are  shell- 
shy  or  not!" 

Boone  took  his  aluminum  teacup  in  his  hand, 
and  held  it  to  his  lips.  Simultaneously  another  shell 
landed  outside  —  fifty  yards  short  of  the  parapet  this 
tune.  The  earth  shook.  Fragments  of  dirt  and  grit 
fell  from  the  sandbag  ceiling  into  the  tea.  Boone 
regarded  the  hand  which  was  holding  the  teacup. 
He  noted  with  secret  satisfaction  that  though  his 
heart  was  bumping  slightly,  the  hand  was  as  steady 
as  a  rock. 

'•'That  is  what  is  known  as  'bracketing,'  I 
guess,"  said  Nichols.  "The  next  shell  will  strike  an 
average  between  the  ranges  of  the  first  two  and  get 
this  happy  home  of  ours  just  where  the  cork  got 
the  bottle." 

He  was  right — or  nearly.  Next  moment,  with  a 
triumphant  shriek,  a  shell  landed  fauly  in  the 
trench,  fifteen  yards  to  their  right.  They  felt  little 
concussion,  for  the  trench  was  provided  with  stout 
earthen  traverses,  which  limited  the  radius  of  the 
explosion  and  blanketed  its  force. 


CHASING  MONOTONY  145 

"The  question  before  the  House,"  said  Boone, 
"is  whether  we  stay  where  we  are  or  go  away  from 
here.  Hallo,  what's  that?" 

A  hoarse  cry  was  passing  down  the  trench  from 
mouth  to  mouth  —  a  cry  which  never  fails  to  tug 
at  a  soldier's  heart,  for  he  knows  not  what  comrade 
may  be  involved : 

* '  Stretcher-bearers ! ' ' 

Both  officers  scrambled  out  of  their  shelter. 
Three  men,  crouching  inside  the  entrance  to  a 
neighbouring  dugout,  had  been  hit  by  fragments 
of  shell  —  all  in  the  legs.  In  due  course  the  stretch- 
ers arrived,  and  the  trio  —  our  first  actual  casual- 
ties —  were  borne  off  upon  that  long  and  tortuous 
journey  which  starts  in  a  communication- trench 
and  ends  possibly  at  Home.  They  were  followed 
by  the  mingled  chorus  of  sympathy  and  congratu- 
lation always  accorded  in  these  days  to  those  who 
are  taken,  by  those  who  are  left. 

More  German  shells  arrived.  The  parapet  was 
hit  in  two  places,  and  burst  sandbags  flew  in  the 
air.  But  it  was  not  "heavy  stuff  "  —  so  the  artillery 
officer  remarked,  busy  in  his  forward  observing- 
station  with  periscope  and  telephone  —  and  the 
actual  damage  was  slight. 

"I  am  calling  for  retaliation  now,"  he  explained 
to  Boone  and  Jim.  He  gabbled  a  formula  to  the 
telephone  orderly,  who  repeated  it  into  a  portable 
instrument  before  him.  Presently  the  man  looked 
up. 

"Battery  fired!"  he  announced.  And  a  few 
moments  later  — 


146  THE  LAST  MILLION 

Whish!  Whishf  Whish!  Whish! 

Four  hissing  streaks  of  sound  passed  over  the 
trench  from  the  rear.  Next  moment  four  heavy 
detonations  shook  the  earth.  A  hundred  pairs  of 
eager  eyes,  peeping  cautiously  over  the  parapet, 
observed  four  fountains  of  earth  and  smoke  spring 
up  in  No  Man's  Land. 

"  Short ! "  muttered  the  gunner  officer,  and  issued 
a  corrective  order. 

So  the  duel  went  on.  It  was  a  typical  artillery 
fight,  in  that  each  side  endeavoured  to  dissuade  its 
opponent  from  further  participation  by  bombard- 
ing, not  one  another,  but  one  another's  friends  in 
the  trenches.  The  German  fire  did  not  slacken;  if 
anything  it  increased.  Probably  Brother  Boche  was 
well  aware  that  a  fresh  division  had  taken  over  the 
line,  and  desired  to  make  a  good  first  impression. 
But  there  were  no  more  casualties. 

'T'm  tired  of  this.  What  about  finishing  our 
tea?"  enquired  Boone  Cruttenden  of  Jim  Nichols. 

''Sure  thing,"  said  Jim.  "Come  on!" 

But  no.  As  they  rounded  the  traverse  leading 
into  their  own  particular  bay,  there  came  a  roar 
and  a  bang  —  and  their  home  was  not.  When  the 
smoke  cleared  away  they  saw,  instead  of  a  rugged 
and  workmanlike  parapet,  a  jumbled  heap  of  dis- 
integrated sandbags  and  twisted  timber-work. 

Jim  Nichols  turned  to  his  companion,  with  his 
slow  smile. 

"There!"  he  said.  "Do  you  still  hold  that  the 
best  place  during  a  bombardment  is  a  dugout?" 


CHASING  MONOTONY  147 

"I'm  stung,  I  admit,"  said  Boone.  "But  now 
you  can  test  your  theory.  You  can  sit  in  the  mid- 
dle of  that  mess  that  the  shell  has  made.  It 's  in  full 
view  of  the  enemy,  but  of  course  you'll  be  safe!" 

The  rival  theorist  smiled  again. 

"I  confess  I  have  died  on  that  proposition,"  he 
said. 


CHAPTER  THIRTEEN 

AN  EXCURSION  AND  AN  ALARUM 

We  now  regard  ourselves,  justifiably,  as  initiated. 

We  have  been  bombarded  fairly  regularly.  We 
do  not  like  it,  but  we  can  stand  it,  which  is  all  that 
matters  —  as  eels  probably  remark  while  being 
skinned.  We  are  getting  used,  also,  to  the  sight  of 
sudden  death  and  human  blood.  These  things  affect 
us  less  than  we  expected.  It  is  all  a  matter  of  envi- 
ronment. If  you  were  to  see  a  man  caught  and  cut 
in  two  between  a  street-car  and  a  taxi-cab  in  your 
own  home  town,  the  spectacle  would  make  you 
physically  sick  and  might  haunt  you  for  weeks, 
because  such  incidents  are  not  part  of  the  recog- 
nized routine  of  home  town  life.  But  here,  they  are 
part  of  the  day's  work:  we  are  prepared  for  them: 
they  are  what  we  are  in  the  War  for.  And,  curi- 
ously and  providentially,  it  seldom  occurs  to  any 
of  us  to  suspect  that  it  may  be  his  turn  next.  Thus 
all-wise  Nature  maintains  our  balance  for  us. 

We  have  made  another  interesting  discovery 
about  Nature,  and  that  is  that  habit  can  be 
stronger  than  instinct,  and  pride  than  either.  The 
first  law  of  Nature  is  said  to  be  the  instinct  of  self- 
preservation.  Yet  the  average  soldier,  even  in  the 
inferno  of  modern  warfare,  gives  less  trouble  to  his 
leaders  when  under  shell-fire  than  when  his  dinner 
does  not  come  up  to  the  usual  standard,  or  he  has 
run  out  of  cigarettes. 


AN  EXCURSION  149 

Pride,  again.  This  morning,  two  machine-gun- 
ners, namely,  one  Sam  Gates  and  om*  old  friend 
Miss  Sissy  Smithers,  observed  through  their  loop- 
hole a  derelict  German  helmet  lying  amid  the  hedge 
of  rusty  barbed  wire  outside  the  trench.  The  pas- 
sion for  souvenirs  is  inborn  in  the  human  race,  but 
most  strongly  developed  in  soldiers  taking  their  first 
turn  in  the  trenches. 

"Me  for  that  lid!"  announced  Sissy. 

''How  are  you  gonna  get  it?"  enquired  his 
friend. 

''The  only  way  I  know  of.  Going  over  the  top 
and  fetching  it." 

Sam  stared  meditatively  through  the  loophole, 
and  remarked  carelessly: 

'*  You  '11  wait  till  it  gets  dark,  I  guess." 

Human  nature  is  a  curious  thing.  Sissy  Smithers 
was  reckoned  a  quiet  youth.  In  civil  life  he  earned 
a  romantic  but  unheroic  livelihood  by  selling  ladies' 
hosiery.  But  his  friend's  perfectly  casual  and  rea- 
sonable observation  stung  him  to  the  roots  of  his 
being.  His  face  flamed.  Without  a  word  he  scram- 
bled upon  the  firing-step,  heaved  himself  over  the 
parapet,  walked  quite  dehberately  to  the  barbed 
wire,  and  brought  back  the  helmet.  The  helmet 
had  a  chip  in  it.  The  chip  was  made  by  a  German 
sniper  as  Sissy  lifted  the  helmet  out  of  the  wire. 

The  Boche  employs  other  vehicles  of  frightful- 
ness  besides  artillery.  The  Flying  Pig,  for  example. 
This  engaging  animal  is  really  an  aerial  mine, 
about  six  feet  long.  It  appears  suddenly  high  in 
the  air  above  No  Man's  Land,  propelled  thither  by 


150  THE  LAST  MILLION 

some  invisible  and  inaudible  agency  behind  the 
German  line,  and  descends  upon  us  in  a  series  of 
amusing  somersaults.  Having  reached  its  destina- 
tion it  explodes,  with  results  disastrous  to  the 
landscape.  A  single  Flying  Pig  can  do  more  damage 
than  a  whole  artillery  bombardment.  But  it  pos- 
sesses one  redeeming  feature.  You  can  see  it  coming. 
When  you  do,  the  correct  procedure  is  to  decide 
quickly  where  it  is  going  to  come  down,  and  then 
go  somewhere  else.  It  is  an  exhilarating  pastime, 
but  attended  by  complications  when  played  by  a 
large  number  of  persons  in  a  narrow  trench  — 
especially  when  differences  of  opinion  exist  as  to 
where  the  animal  really  intends  to  alight. 

Then  there  is  gas.  But  gas  is  more  of  a  nuisance 
than  a  danger  in  these  days,  since  we  are  all  —  even 
the  horses  —  equipped  with  a  special  breathing 
apparatus,  and  carry  the  same  night  and  day.  Our 
newest  mask,  too,  is  a  great  advance  on  its  predeces- 
sors. The  chief  trouble  about  gas-masks  hitherto  has 
been  the  formation  of  mist  on  the  inside  of  the  gog- 
gles. Now,  by  the  happy  inspiration  of  some  name- 
less benefactor  in  the  Service  of  Supply,  the  breath- 
ing tubes  are  so  arranged  that  the  filtered  air,  when 
it  arrives,  passes  right  over  the  inner  surface  of  the 
eye-pieces,  clearing  the  glass  at  every  intake  of 
breath. 

Mustard  gas  is  another  story,  because  it  attacks 
the  skin  —  unless  you  happen  to  be  a  coloured 
gentleman,  and  then  apparently  you  do  not  mind 
so  much. 

But  our  busy  time  is  at  night.  Supplies  come  up; 


AN  EXCURSION  151 

casualties  go  back.  Trench  repairs  have  to  be  exe- 
cuted in  places  inaccessible  by  dayhght.  Sandbags 
innumerable  have  to  be  filled  and  set  in  position. 

''This  yer  War,"  observes  Joe  McCarthy,  bit- 
terly, ''will  be  finished  when  all  the  dirt  in  France 
has  been  shovelled  into  sandbags  — by  you  an' 
me!  Then  they'll  have  to  quit,  or  fall  through!" 

But  the  most  thrilling  experiences  of  trench  war- 
fare are  trench  raids.  These  are  not  necessarily 
elaborate  affairs.  Some  of  them  are  quite  informal. 
Their  objects  are  twofold  —  the  first,  to  keep  the 
enemy  guessing,  the  second,  to  obtain  information. 
The  second  is  the  most  important.  It  is  vitally 
necessary  to  know  just  where  every  one  of  your 
enemy's  Divisions  is  located.  The  simplest  method 
of  finding  out  is  to  send  over  armed  deputations 
in  the  dead  of  night,  with  instructions  to  bring 
back  a  few  assorted  Germans.  These,  when  they 
arrive,  are  interrogated,  and  their  equipment  and 
shoulder-straps  are  examined,  for  clues  as  to  their 
identity.  In  this  way  it  is  usually  possible  to  dis- 
cover what  Divisions  are  in  station  opposite,  and 
how  much  front  each  holds.  If  a  Division  is  spread 
out  widely,  you  may  be  tolerably  sure  that  the 
enemy  has  no  serious  designs  upon  your  sector  of 
the  line.  But  if  Divisions  are  "distributed  in 
depth"  —  that  is,  with  narrow  fronts  and  long 
tails  —  the  wise  commander  begins  to  accumulate 
ammunition  and  draft  reserves  into  his  back  areas. 
Before  the  great  German  drive  in  March,  against 
the  attenuated  British  line  at  St.  Quentin,  Sh- 
Douglas  Haig  was  made  aware,  by  this  and  other 


152  THE  LAST  MILLION 

means,  of  the  cheering  intelHgence  that  he  had 
opposite  to  a  comparatively  short  sector  of  his 
front  sixty-four  German  Divisions  —  or  six  more 
Divisions  than  there  were  British  Divisions  in  the 
whole  of  France  and  Belgium!  That  was  a  case  in 
which  nothing  could  be  done  except  put  up  the 
best  defence  possible  with  the  troops  available,  for 
equally  overwhelming  odds  were  being  massed 
against  the  rest  of  the  British  line.  But  in  normal 
cases,  to  be  forewarned  is  to  be  forearmed. 

Trench  raids  are  intermittent  affairs.  Patrols, 
on  the  other  hand,  must  be  organized  every  night. 
These  excursions  are  not  necessarily  belligerent. 
Their  main  object  is  to  collect  information,  and  to 
make  sure  that  the  enemy  keeps  to  his  own  side  of 
the  street.  If  two  patrols  do  meet,  and  feel  con- 
strained to  "start  something,"  the  one  thing  no 
one  ever  does  is  to  pull  a  gun  or  throw  a  bomb. 
To  do  so  would  be  to  invite  impartial  participa- 
tion in  the  game  by  the  machine  guns  of  both  sides. 
It  must  be  cold  steel  or  nothing.  As  often  as  not, 
it  is  nothing.  Two  patrols  may  meet,  and  cut  one 
another  dead,  like  rival  beauties  on  Fifth  Avenue. 

One  night  Boone  Cruttenden  found  himself  de- 
tailed for  patrol  duty,  with  a  sergeant  and  four 
men.  The  party  were  to  scale  the  parapet,  pass 
through  a  gap  in  the  wire,  and  make  a  tour  of  a 
certain  section  of  No  Man's  Land.  The  whole  oper- 
ation, which  was  by  this  time  a  familiar  one,  was 
expected  to  occupy  about  an  hour.  Orders  were 
given  to  the  trench  garrison  that  there  must  be 
no  firing  during  this  period. 


AN  EXCURSION  153 

Just  before  midnight,  in  the  soft  September 
darkness,  Boone  led  his  followers  over  the  sand- 
bags. It  was  a  quiet  night  —  suspiciously  quiet  — 
and  there  was  httle  to  be  heard  save  some  impatient 
rips  of  machine-gun  fire  farther  south,  and  the  soft 
explosion  of  the  Verey  pistols  on  both  sides.  There 
are  three  impressions  of  nocturnal  trench  warfare 
which  never  fade  from  the  memory  of  those  who 
have  served  their  apprenticeship  therein  —  one,  the 
endless  vista  of  bursting  star-shells  sinking  from 
the  sky  along  that  tortuous,  dolorous  way  that  calls 
itself  No  Man's  Land;  two,  the  eternal  plop-plop! 
of  the  Verey  pistols;  three,  the  mingled  smell  of 
fresh  earth,  decaying  matter,  and  disinfectants. 

Boone's  first  objective  was  a  deep  shell-crater 
some  fifteen  yards  outside  the  wire.  He  had  dis- 
covered it  two  nights  previously,  and  it  had  struck 
him  as  a  useful  location  for  an  advanced  patrolling 
base.  He  gathered  his  henchmen  around  him  and 
addressed  them  in  a  low  voice. 

''Sergeant,  you  stay  here  with  McCarthy.  Gil- 
lette and  Thompson,  crawl  along  our  own  front 
in  that  direction"  —  he  pointed  south  —  "until 
you  come  to  the  row  of  willow  stumps  that  runs 
across  from  our  line  to  theirs.  (It's  an  old  turnpike, 
really.)  Examine  our  wire  all  the  way  along,  and 
see  if  it  has  been  monkeyed  with.  If  you  catch  sight 
of  an  enemy  patrol,  Gillette  will  stay  and  watch 
w^hile  Thompson  gets  back  here  and  reports  to  the 
sergeant.  Gillette,  you  will  not  take  any  notice  of 
them"  —  Eddie  sighed  brokenly  —  ''unless  they 
show  signs  of  wanting  to  come  too  close  to  our 


154  THE  LAST  MILLION 

trenches."  (Eddie's  spirits  rose  again.)  ''Then  use 
your  own  judgment.  Your  best  plan  will  probably 
be  to  get  home  by  the  shortest  route  and  warn  the 
officer  in  charge.  But  don't  start  any  trouble  if  you 
can  help  it,  because  I  shall  be  over  on  the  other 
side  with  Gogarty,  and  we  want  to  get  home  too ! 
In  any  case  we  must  all  be  back  in  an  hour,  because 
the  artillery  have  a  date  with  the  German  back 
areas  at  two,  and  we  don't  want  to  get  mixed  up 
in  any  retaHation  that  may  be  going.  Gogarty, 
follow  me  up  this  dry  ditch.  It  leads  right  to  the 
German  wire,  and  we  may  find  a  German  sentry- 
post  halfway  across.  So  come  quietly." 

The  two  little  expeditions  crept  away,  on  routes 
at  right  angles  to  one  another.  We  will  follow 
Boone  and  Mr.  James  Gogarty,  who  has  not  hith- 
erto been  introduced  to  the  reader. 

Jimmy  Gogarty  was  twenty  years  of  age,  of 
wizened  appearance,  and  raucous  voice.  He  looked 
and  sounded  exactly  like  what  he  was  —  a  bell- 
hop. He  had  exchanged  livery  for  uniform  at  the 
first  breath  of  hostilities,  and  was  now  reckoned 
one  of  the  smartest  scouts  in  Boone's  Company. 
He  was  a  New  Yorker  born  and  bred,  and  had 
fought  his  way  steadily  up  the  social  ladder  of 
Second  Avenue  by  the  exercise  of  five  remarkably 
sharp  wits  and  two  unpleasantly  hard  fists.  He 
was  devoted  to  Boone  Cruttenden. 

The  trenches  were  about  two  hundred  yards 
apart.  Progress  along  the  ditch  was  not  easy, 
for  it  was  choked  with  undergrowth  and  refuse. 
Moreover,  there  were  here  and  there  unburied 


AN  EXCURSION  155 

Germans  whom  it  were  wiser  to  avoid.  Occasion- 
ally the  ditch  was  intersected  by  other  routes  — 
old  trenches,  and  the  like.  Here  they  Stopped, 
Looked,  and  Listened,  as  they  had  been  warned 
to  do  all  their  lives  at  more  peaceful  cross-roads 
far  away.  But  all  was  quiet.  Too  quiet,  Boone 
thought.  On  his  previous  excursions  he  had  usu- 
ally been  aware  of  much  life  —  furtive,  guttural, 
inquisitive  life  —  all  around  him.  But  to-night  No 
Man's  Land  seemed  a  desert. 

Boone  w^hispered  his  suspicions  to  his  squire. 

''I  guess  dat  means  de  bums  is  goin'  to  start 
somethin',"  observed  Mr.  Gogarty  hoarsely.  (He 
was  regrettably  tough  in  his  speech.  The  thin 
veneer  of  hotel  civiHzation  had  long  been  rubbed 
off  him.) 

''We  are  fairly  close  to  their  wire  now,"  whis- 
pered Boone.  "I  am  going  to  get  out  of  this  drain 
and  prospect  along  their  front.  You  go  straight 
ahead,  and  watch  out  in  case  they  come  crawling 
down  the  ditch.  If  they  do,  give  a  whistle  —  just 
one  —  to  warn  me,  and  then  beat  it  for  the  Ser- 
geant. Otherwise,  expect  me  here  in  ten  minutes." 

"I  get  you,"  said  James  agreeably. 

Ten  minutes  later  the  pair  met  in  the  appointed 
spot.  Boone  was  covered  with  mud  and  panting 
heavily :  Gogarty  was  quiescent,  except  that  he  was 
emitting  a  peculiar  noise.  If  he  had  been  a  cat,  you 
would  have  said  he  was  purring. 

"Seen  anything?"  asked  Boone. 

''Yep." 

''What?" 


156  THE  LAST  MILLION 

''Two  Dutchmen!  Dey  was  in  dis  ditch  —  'bout 
thoity  yards  along.  Keepin'  watch,  I  guesg.  Some 
watch!" 

"Where  are  they  now?  " 

' '  Still  there.  Quite  stiU  —  there ! ' ' 

''You  mean,  —  ?" 

"Well,  I  ain't  one  to  blow,  but  —  I'm  here,  and 
dey  are  not!  You  seen  anything,  Captain?" 

"Yes;  listen!  There's  a  German  raiding-party, 
or  something,  mustering  outside  their  wire.  I  saw 
them  creeping  into  line,  one  by  one,  when  the  moon 
came  out  just  now.  They  are  coming  across,  and 
soon!" 

"How  are  dey  going  to  get  through  our  wire?" 
enquired  practical  James. 

"Either  break  it  up  with  a  five-minute  trench- 
mortar  bombardment,  or  creep  forward  and  blow 
a  few  gaps  with  dynamite  torpedoes.  Now,  I  am 
going  to  wait  here  until  they  start  moving.  Then 
I  shall  get  back,  quick.  Meanwhile"  —  Boone 
tugged  at  his  field  despatch-book  —  "I  want  you 
to  take  a  note  to  Major  Powers." 

Flat  on  his  stomach,  Boone  was  squirming  deep 
into  the  rank  undergrowth  of  the  ditch. 

"Hold  this  electric  torch  right  down  over  the 
paper,"  he  said,  "while  I  write.  Keep  a  good  look- 
out at  the  same  time,  and  if  you  see  any  one, 
switch  it  off." 

For  two  minutes  Boone  scribbled  frantically. 
The  fighting  blood  of  all  the  Cruttendens  was 
coursing  in  his  veins.  He  forgot  the  official  form  of 
address:  he  omitted  certain  prescribed  formulae  — 


AN  EXCURSION  157 

the  date,  the  hour,  his  own  geographical  position 
but  he  overlooked  nothing  else.  The  despatch, 
when  completed,  read: 

Dear  Major,  the  Hun  is  going  to  raid  you.  So  far 
as  I  can  see  it  will  be  between  the  points  A  and  B  on 
attached  sketch.  I  suggest  you  send  out  a  m.-g.  to 
shell-hole  marked  X,  from  which  you  can  enfilade 
whole  front  in  danger.  Come  to  shell-hole  yourself,  or 
send  some  one,  and  I  will  come  along  and  warn  you 
as  soon  as  I  see  them  start. 

''Take  that  to  Major  Powers  right  away,"  he 
said.  "As  you  pass  through  the  shell-hole  warn  the 
Sergeant,  and  tell  him  to  expect  a  machine  gun 
there.  But  whatever  you  do,  find  the  Major!  Try 
Battalion  Headquarters  first  —  in  the  support-line. 
If  he  is  not  there,  he'll  be  in  the  firing-trench.  But 
find  him,  whatever  you  do,  and  quick!" 

''I'll  find  him,"  replied  the  retired  bell-hop,  con- 
fidently. "Why,  I  found  people  in  the  Biltmore 
before  now!" 

He  began  to  creep  away. 

"Come  back  here,  of  course,"  added  Boone. 

Mr.  Gogarty  chuckled  hoarsely. 

"Cap,"  he  replied,  "you  betcher!" 

Ten  minutes  passed.  Boone,  tingling  like  an  in- 
duction coil,  watched  the  progress  of  the  raiding- 
party.  They  were  moving  very  methodically,  keep- 
ing a  beautiful  line.  Whenever  a  Verey  hght  burst 
above  them,  or  the  moon  asserted  herself,  they 
were  flat  on  their  faces  in  a  moment;  but  during 


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AN  EXCURSION  159 

the  next  period  of  darkness  they  always  seemed 
to  cover  another  twenty  yards.  They  were  halfway 
across  now,  almost  exactly  opposite  to  Boone. 

Another  ten  minutes.  Still  no  Gogarty. 

"I  wonder  where  he  is,"  muttered  Boone  rest- 
lessly. *'We  ought  to  have  a  watch  on  the  far  end 
of  this  ditch.  If  they  come  creeping  along  it,  as 
they  ought  to  do  —  Gee  whizz!" 

From  behind  the  German  line  came  a  chorus  of 
sharp  discharges;  then  a  whirring  and  a  humming 
over  Boone's  head.  Then  the  earth  rocked  beneath 
the  tremendous  detonation,  and  the  skies  were  lit 
up  with  the  flash  of  a  barrage  of  German  trench- 
mortar  bombs,  exploding  along  two  hundred  yards 
of  American  wire. 

The  barrage  lasted  just  one  minute.  Directly 
after,  three  things  happened,  almost  simultane- 
ously. The  line  of  raiders  rose  to  its  feet  and  dashed 
with  a  yell  through  the  writhing  remnants  of  the 
w^ire.  The  voice  of  a  machine  gun  —  nay,  a  pair  of 
machine  guns  —  broke  into  steady  reverberation 
from  the  shell-crater,  seventy  yards  to  Boone's 
right.  Lastly,  a  rocket  shot  up  from  the  American 
support-line. 

"That 's  for  our  artillery,"  said  Boone  to  himself. 
"They'll  be  putting  down  a  heavy  barrage  on  No 
Man's  Land  in  a  moment  —  right  here.  Good-night, 
nurse!" 

He  began  to  run  swiftly  back  along  the  ditch, 
crouching  low.  In  this  posture  he  rounded  a  slight 
bend,  and  two  steel  helmets  clashed  together. 
Boone,  standing  up  to  massage  his  ringing  head, 


160  THE  LAST  MILLION 

realized  that  the  faithful  Gogarty  had  returned  to 
duty. 

''We  got  dem  guys  fixed  this  time!"  announced 
the  scout  triumphantly.  "  Two  Vickers  guns  in  de 
shell-hole,  to  give  'em  hell  comin'  and  goin'!' 

It  was  true.  Major  Powers  had  done  marvels  in 
the  twenty  scant  minutes  at  his  disposal.  He  had 
decided  to  send  two  machine  guns  over  to  the  shell- 
hole;  for  ammunition-belts  sometimes  jam,  and  it 
was  essential  that  a  continuous  stream  of  bullets 
should  be  maintained  along  the  wire  during  the 
fateful  moment  of  attack.  He  had  also  warned  the 
Artillery  and  Brigade  Headquarters  of  impending 
events.  Finally,  he  had  withdrawn  his  trench  gar- 
rison from  the  front  line  as  a  precaution  against 
a  trench-mortar  bombardment,  and  had  aligned 
them,  with  bayonets  fixed,  in  the  support-trench 
behind,  with  orders  to  dash  forward  to  their 
original  positions  the  moment  the  signal  was  given. 

They  were  hasty  preparations,  but  six  weeks' 
rehearsal  could  not  have  made  their  success  more 
complete.  It  was  just  such  an  undertaking  as  suits 
the  American  soldier  —  without  cohesion  or  direct 
leadership,  and  depending  almost  entirely  upon 
quick  grasp  of  the  situation  and  spontaneous  team- 
work. The  German  attacking  party,  plunging 
forward  through  the  broken  defences,  came  right 
into  line  with  the  Vickers  guns,  with  the  result  that 
it  found  itself  wading  through  a  river  of  lead  flow- 
ing at  the  rate  of  five  hundred  bullets  per  minute 
at  a  distance  of  eighteen  inches  from  the  ground. 
Many  went  down  at  once:  the  others  stumbled 


AN  EXCURSION  161 

on  gallantly  enough,  and  reached  the  American 
trench  just  in  time  to  see  a  wave  of  yelling  Ameri- 
can soldiers  break  into  it  from  the  ground  behind. 

Some  of  the  raiders  leapt  down  into  the  trench, 
and  were  submerged  at  once.  A  few  threw  bombs, 
most  of  which  were  deftly  caught  and  thrown  back 
before  they  could  explode.  Others  were  engaged 
upon  the  parapet  itself.  The  rest,  making  heavy 
weather  in  the  wire  and  tortured  by  the  stream  of 
bullets,  broke  back,  only  to  find  that  the  second 
machine  gun  was  maintaining  a  steady  enfilade  fire 
across  their  line  of  retreat. 

At  the  height  of  the  turmoil  the  sky  far  behind 
the  American  lines  was  suddenly  illuminated  by 
flashes.  Next  moment,  with  a  rush  and  a  roar,  the 
American  retaliatory  barrage  was  tearing  up  No 
Man's  Land  and  the  German  fire-trenches  beyond. 
The  raiders  were  completely  isolated. 

For  four  minutes  the  tempest  of  shells  raged. 
Then,  with  stunning  suddenness,  came  silence, 
grim  as  death,  broken  only  by  a  few  hoarse  cries 
and  a  little  sjTnpathetic  uneasiness  farther  down 
the  line.  The  raid  was  over.  How  it  had  fared  the 
Germans  over  the  way  never  knew,  for  not  a  single 
raider  came  back  to  tell  them. 

The  dead  and  wounded  enemy  were  disentan- 
gled from  the  wire,  where  most  of  them  had  fallen. 
American  casualties,  thanks  to  Boone's  warning 
and  Major  Powers's  dispositions,  had  been  com- 
paratively slight,  though  the  bombs  had  taken  a 
certain  gruesome  toll.  Eddie  Gillette,  who  with 
Al  Thompson  had  returned  from  his  tour  of  in- 


162  THE  LAST  MILLION 

spection  just  in  time  to  take  part  in  the  defence  of 
the  trench,  was  suffering  from  abraded  knuckles, 
due  to  an  encounter  with  a  set  of  Teutonic  teeth. 
Otherwise,  none  of  our  particular  friends  had  re- 
ceived a  scratch,  though  Boone  and  Gogarty  had 
escaped  their  own  artillery  barrage  by  four  seconds. 

An  hour  later  the  life  of  the  line  had  reverted 
once  more  from  Hell  to  Monotony.  A  working- 
party  was  out  in  front,  repairing  wire  and  replacing 
sandbags.  Patrols  were  out  again,  in  case  the  enemy 
should  feel  disposed  to  throw  good  money  after 
bad.  The  artillery  stood  to,  prepared  to  resume 
the  argument  if  need  be.  But  not  a  German  gun 
cheeped  all  night.  Possibly  they  were  surprised 
about  something. 

Meanwhile  a  string  of  prisoners  was  filing  back 
to  Regimental  Headquarters,  down  a  communi- 
cation-trench —  or  hoyau,  to  employ  the  expres- 
sive phrase  of  its  Gallic  constructors  —  muddy,  di- 
shevelled, and  sulky.  German  prisoners  in  these 
days  are  not  usually  sulky:  most  of  them  are 
frankly  delighted  to  be  counted  out  of  the  War. 
But  this  particular  consignment  were  distin- 
guished, under  their  grime,  by  a  certain  peculiar 
and  awful  air  of  outraged  majesty. 

On  arrival  at  Headquarters  the  mystery  was 
revealed.  An  American  Staff  Officer,  an  expert 
linguist,  took  charge  of  the  party,  and  issued  the 
usual  orders. 

**  Sergeant,  find  out  if  there  are  any  officers  among 
them,  and  put  them  by  themselves.  Then  search 
the  others." 


AN  EXCURSION  163 

He  was  answered  —  in  tolerable  English  —  by 
a  lanky  youth  who  stood  at  the  end  of  the  long  line 
of  prisoners. 

''We  are  all  officers!"  he  announced,  with  dig- 
nity. 

It  was  a  simple  enough  explanation,  really.  This 
was  no  common  or  vulgar  raiding-party.  It  was  a 
junior  officers'  Instruction  Class,  sent  over  to  gain 
a  little  experience  and  confidence  in  the  delicate 
art  of  trench-raiding  on  this  ''quiet  sector  of  the 
line."  It  was  a  genuine  and  painful  shock  to  them 
to  find  that  the  line  was  held  by  the  Americans 
in  force  —  the  Americans,  who,  according  to  the 
Great  General  Staff  at  Headquarters,  were  still 
at  home,  chasing  buffaloes  down  Broadway.  Too 
bad! 

But  already  these  small  diversions  are  swept 
into  the  limbo  of  the  Things  that  do  not  Matter. 
Word  has  just  come  that  our  period  of  trench  war- 
fare is  over,  and  that  we  are  to  proceed  to  the 
Argonne,  to  take  part  in  the  Great  Offensive. 

Evidently  some  one  at  the  top  has  decided  that 
this  War  has  gone  on  long  enough. 


CHAPTER  FOURTEEN 

THE  FOREST  OF  THE  ARGONNE 

During  the  past  fortnight  we  have  been  learning 
the  difference  between  Warfare  of  Position  and 
Warfare  of  Movement,  and  we  are  very,  very  tired. 
Moreover,  the  end  of  our  labour  is  not  yet.  But 
we  have  made  good.  The  Divisional  General  him- 
self has  informed  us  of  the  fact,  in  an  official  Order. 
So  has  the  enemy,  in  an  even  more  flattering  fash- 
ion. He  has  fallen  back  —  steadily  and  stubbornly 
—  but  back. 

The  fighting  began  more  than  a  fortnight  ago. 
But  first  of  all  we  had  to  get  to  the  scene  of  action. 
That  involved  endless  marches,  through  undulat- 
ing, heavily  wooded,  exhausting  country.  It  is  the 
fall  of  the  year.  Rain  is  abundant,  roads  are  not 
too  numerous,  and  these  are  packed  from  end  to 
end  with  traffic  so  close  that  it  is  sometimes  im- 
possible for  a  vehicle  to  find  turning-space  in  ten 
miles. 

These  roads,  though  well  constructed  and  con- 
stantly reenforced,  are  none  too  good.  They  were 
never  built  to  carry  such  traffic  as  this,  and  since 
the  inevitable  ditch  on  either  side  deprives  them 
of  lateral  support,  the  effect  of  a  constant  stream 
of  monstrously  heavy  vehicles  upon  the  surface  of 
one  of  them  is  that  of  a  rolling-pin  upon  a  strip  of 
dough  —  it  makes  it  wider.  Not  only  wider,  but 
thinner;  for  the  edges  of  the  road  are  squeezed  out 


THE  FOREST  OF  THE  ARGONNE     165 

into  the  ditch,  and  the  whole  fabric  loses  cohesion. 
Almost  anywhere,  but  in  particular  near  the  sides, 
a  wheel  is  apt  suddenly  to  find  a  soft  spot  and  sink 
up  to  the  axle,  with  consequent  congestion  and 

tumult. 

It  is  a  double  tide  of  traffic.  Both  streams  are 
made  up  of  similar  constituents,  with  certain 
necessary  contrasts.  There  are  bodies  of  infantry, 
either  going  up  into  action  or  else  coming  out. 
There  is  no  mistaking  the  latter.  Their  uniforms 
are  splashed,  their  faces  are  caked,  and  their  eyes 
are  red  for  lack  of  sleep.  They  are  obviously  ''all 
in,"  but  they  hobble  manfully  along,  with  the  com- 
fortable satisfaction  of  men  who  have  left  behind 
them  a  task  well  and  truly  performed.  They  ex- 
change ironic  greetings  with  the  full-fed,  boisterous 
bands  of  adventurers  whom  they  encounter  hasten- 
ing in  the  opposite  direction. 

Ambulances,  again.  Those  going  forward  are 
empty  and  trim:  those  returning  are  travel-stained 
and  crowded.  It  is  rumoured  that  the  American 
Army  has  suffered  over  a  hundred  thousand  cas- 
ualties during  the  past  few  weeks.  The  fighting  in 
the  Argonne  Forest  has  been  terrific.  Grandpr^, 
through  which  we  expect  to  pass,  has  been  taken 
and  lost  half  a  dozen  times.  Each  of  the  ambulances 
carries  a  full  complement  of  stretcher-cases;  and 
usually  beside  the  driver  sits  a  gaunt,  miry  statue 
with  his  arm  in  a  sUng,  or  a  blood-soaked  rag  about 
his  head.  Occasionally,  too,  there  occurs  a  civilian 
farm-wagon,  containing  a  dozen  or  so  less  serious 
cases,  with  tickets  tied  to  their  buttons,  on  their 


166  THE  LAST  MILLION 

way  to  an  Evacuation  Station.  There  are  also 
women  and  children  passengers;  for  the  battle 
zone  is  extending  daily,  and  it  is  needful,  from 
sheer  humanity,  to  remove  the  civil  population  to 
safer  ground.  On  the  box-seat  of  one  of  these  wag- 
ons sits  a  small  French  boy.  Perhaps  he  is  eight 
years  old.  He  is  easily  the  proudest  and  happiest 
person  in  all  this  dolorous  procession,  for  his  right 
wrist  is  swathed  in  a  slightly  encrimsoned  bandage, 
gloriously  conspicuous. 

Then  there  are  motor  wagons,  also  full.  Those 
going  up  contain  ammunition,  barbed  wire,  gal- 
vanized iron  sheeting,  engineering  material,  or 
rations.  Those  returning  are  heaped  with  salvage 
of  every  kind  —  furniture,  the  property  of  the  refu- 
gees; battlefield  debris,  and,  wherever  an  available 
chink  presents  itself,  men  —  footsore  men,  strag- 
glers, or  regular  working-parties.  The  latter  are 
usually  coloured,  and,  with  steel  helmets  balanced 
at  every  angle  upon  their  woolly  pates,  smile  upon 
the  seething  activity  beneath  them  with  the  simple 
enjoyment  of  a  child  at  its  first  circus. 

These  wagons  —  or  camions  —  are  of  two  types. 
There  are  big  Thorneycroft  lorries,  holding  three 
tons  and  made  in  England,  and  smaller  vehicles  of 
American  design,  known  as  ''Quads."  These  pos- 
sess the  unusual  feature  of  a  drive  upon  either  axle ; 
so  that  if  your  rear  wheels  slip  backwards  into  a 
ditch  or  quagmire,  your  front  wheels  will  continue 
to  function  and  will  extricate  you  in  no  time. 
Heaven  knows  how  these  contraptions  are  steered, 
but  steered  they  are,  and  with  remarkable  skill. 


THE  FOREST  OF  THE  ARGONNE     167 

Then  there  are  guns  —  and  more  guns.  These 
are  mainly  French  seventy-fives  and  hundred-and- 
fifty-fives,  with  American  gun  teams.  Those  going 
up  are  workmanHke,  but  inconspicuous.  They  are 
newly  painted  with  the  usual  red,  green,  and  yellow 
splashes.  The  fishing-nets  which  will  be  spread 
above  them  when  they  get  into  action,  intersticed 
with  grass,  leaves,  and  twigs,  are  at  present  neatly 
furled  and  lashed  along  the  barrels.  The  gunners 
sprawl  anywhere  but  upon  their  hard  little  iron 
seats.  The  guns  coming  out  look  different.  All  are 
plastered  with  mud ;  some  are  on  the  casualty  list, 
and  are  being  towed  upon  trolleys  by  fussy  little 
traction  engines. 

Here  and  there  in  the  procession  wallow  British 
tanks.  These  are  either  '^  Heavies,"  weighing  nearly 
thirty  tons  and  carrying  a  crew  of  seven  or  eight, 
or  "Whippets,"  which  only  require  three  men  and 
can  move  at  the  rate  of  twelve  miles  an  hour. 

The  tank  is  the  humourist  of  this  unhumorous 
War.  Its  method  of  joining  a  close-packed  proces- 
sion of  road  traffic  is  characteristic.  It  appears 
suddenly  out  of  a  wood  in  a  field  beside  the  road, 
obliterates  thirty  yards  of  a  hedge,  squeezes  a 
ditch  flat,  and  insinuates  itself  sideways,  with 
jolly  abandon,  into  that  part  of  the  procession 
which  happens  to  be  passing  at  the  moment  —  the 
whole  in  a  manner  reminiscent  of  that  heavy- 
footed  and  determined  individual  who  is  accus- 
tomed by  similar  tactics  to  secure  for  himself  a 
good  place  in  the  queue  outside  a  movie  pay-box. 
On  the  other  hand,  should  you  be  ditched  or  dis- 


168  THE  LAST  MILLION 

abled  in  any  way,  to  your  own  discomfort  and  the 
congestion  of  traffic,  a  tank  is  always  willing  to 
swing  good-humouredly  out  of  the  line,  scramble 
across  country  for  a  field  or  so,  lurch  heavily  into 
the  roadway  again,  harness  itself  to  a  tow-rope, 
and  extract  you  from  your  present  predicament  as 
easily  and  as  suddenly  as  a  mastodon  might  extract 
a  cork  from  a  bottle. 

Certainly  our  march  gave  us  a  comprehensive 
view  of  the  ingredients  of  modern  warfare.  Ameri- 
can soldiers,  white  and  black  —  mostly  cheerful; 
French  refugees  —  all  sad.  Guns,  limbers,  camions, 
carts,  ambulances,  tanks  —  all  moving  in  an  end- 
less, tumultuous,  profane  stream.  At  cross-roads, 
traffic  policeman  struggling  manfully  with  an  im- 
possible job.  Automobiles  everyv\here  —  Cadillacs, 
Fords,  and  Dodges  —  all  trying  to  make  openings 
and  steal  a  march  upon  the  rest  of  Creation.  Above 
us,  the  sky  of  France,  weeping  for  her  lost  children. 
Around  us,  the  undulating,  rain-blurred  hillsides 
of  the  Argonne  Forest.  Beneath  our  feet,  Mud, 
Mud,  Mud. 

Day  after  day  we  tramped  —  through  Toul,  the 
northwest  corner  of  the  great  rectangle  of  French 
soil  which  has  been  an  American  military  colony 
since  the  summer  of  nineteen-seventeen;  across 
the  trench  lines  of  the  old  days  of  stationary  war- 
fare, where  Frenchmen  faced  the  Boches  for  three 
long  years.  American  troops  have  fought  there  too. 
Here,  in  what  w^as  once  No  Man's  Land,  stand 
the  ruins  of  Seicheprey,  famed  as  having  been 
the  scene  of  the  first  clash  between  American  and 


THE  FOREST  OF  THE  ARGONNE     169 

German  troops.  (It  was  a  raid,  and  we  lost  our 
first  prisoners  there.  Well,  we  have  plenty  of  Ger- 
mans now  to  barter  for  them,  when  the  time  comes 
—  and  then  some!)  Then  on  past  Montfaucon,  the 
CrowTi  Prince's  headquarters  at  the  Battle  of 
Verdun,  now  an  American  stronghold;  through 
miles  and  miles  of  devastated  country,  with  here 
and  there  a  little  American  graveyard  (to  which 
we  pay  due  reverence),  to  Grandpre.  This  is  a  mere 
fragment  of  a  village,  clinging  to  the  face  of  a  rock 
looking  south,  and  is  shelled  out  of  recognition. 
Then  on,  through  the  Bois  des  Loges,  following  the 
tide  of  victory  northward,  towards  Mezieres  and 
Sedan.  Somewhere  to  our  right  lies  Verdun,  gar- 
risoned by  American  soldiers  —  all,  that  is,  save 
the  Citadel,  a  wondrous  Gibraltar  dug  into  the 
interior  of  a  hill,  containing  miles  of  illuminated 
passageways;  barracks,  a  bakery,  an  arsenal,  a 
chapel,  a  theatre.  Here  the  French  maintain  their 
own  garrison  —  and  maybe  their  own  secrets. 
Secrets  or  no,  it  was  that  Citadel  and  that  garrison 
which  broke  the  back  of  the  German  assault  in  the 
critical  days  of  nineteen-sixteen. 

Somewhere  on  our  left  marches  the  Army  of  the 
French  General  Gouraud,  keeping  pace  with  our 
own  in  the  great  enveloping  movement  of  which 
our  attack  forms  the  extreme  right. 

And  there  we  were  sent  into  the  battle.  It  being 
our  first,  our  impressions  are  somewhat  confused. 
In  theory,  our  own  particular  part  in  the  enterprise 
was  a  simple  one.  A  wood  lay  upon  our  front,  and 


170  THE  LAST  MILLION 

we  were  ordered  to  capture  it.  And  we  did  so 
—  all  save  the  far  edge.  But  at  a  price.  When  our 
barrage  lifted  in  the  early  dawn,  and  we  dashed 
forward  to  the  assault  which  we  had  rehearsed 
so  often,  our  consciousness  was  mainly  of  barbed 
wire  and  machine-gun  bullets.  These  were  in  un- 
holy alliance  everywhere,  and  took  grievous  toll. 
Buck  Stamper,  the  biggest  man  in  the  Battalion, 
was  the  first  one  to  go  down.  He  was  shot  in  the 
legs,  and  another  bullet  passed  through  his  heart 
as  he  struggled  forward,  crippled  but  game,  on  his 
hands  and  knees.  But  a  hundred  men  had  seen  him 
die,  and  the  gun  which  had  knocked  him  out  was 
in  their  hands  three  minutes  later.  Still,  formations 
were  broken  up,  communication  with  the  rear  was 
cut,  and  the  brunt  of  the  battle  began  to  fall  upon 
the  individual.  Now  it  is  as  an  individual  fighter 
that  the  American  soldier  excels.  He  has  his  faults. 
To-day  attacks  have  to  be  carefully  rehearsed; 
battles  are  fought  on  a  strict  time-table.  The  eager 
young  fighter  is  too  apt  to  jump  off  the  mark  before 
the  signal  is  given,  and  overrun  his  objective  when 
he  reaches  it.  This  gets  him  into  trouble  with  his 
best  friend,  the  Gunner;  for  under  these  circum- 
stances the  latter  must  either  forbear  to  fire  or  else 
risk  hitting  his  own  Infantry.  But  it  is  a  fault  on 
the  right  side,  and  is  soon  corrected  by  painful 
experience.  On  the  other  hand,  it  develops  in  its 
owner  that  most  priceless  quality  of  the  soldier, 
initiative.  Some  of  the  finest  work  in  this  War  has 
been  accomplished  by  small  bodies  of  troops  — 
particularly  British  and  American  —  working  for- 


THE  FOREST  OF  THE  ARGONNE     171 

ward  under  a  young  officer,  or  a  sergeant,  or  very 
often  under  no  leader  at  all,  to  the  capture  of  some 
vital  point  long  after  they  have  lost  touch  with  the 
directing  force  behind. 

The  upshot  of  it  all  was  that  after  a  week  of 
hand-to-hand  fighting  and  bloody  murder  we 
cleared  the  tenacious  Hun  right  out  of  the  wood  — 
at  this  point  more  than  a  mile  thick  —  leaving  him 
possessed  of  nothing  but  the  far  edge.  We  are  ter- 
ribly exhausted,  and  our  losses  do  not  bear  thinking 
of;  but  we  have  begged,  before  we  are  withdrawn, 
to  be  permitted  to  capture  that  far  edge  and  con- 
solidate the  whole  position.  Our  prayer  has  been 
granted.  We  attack  to-morrow,  refreshed  by  a  lull 
of  four  days. 

''And,"  observed  Colonel  Graham  to  his  assem- 
bled officers,  ''if  we  Americans  on  the  right  can 
do  our  part,  and  swing  our  horn  of  the  line  clear 
around  through  Metz  and  Sedan,  we  shall  have  the 
whole  German  Army  in  a  pocket.  And  then  — 
may  the  Lord  have  mercy  on  them,  for  we  will 
not!" 

Colonel  Graham  is  a  comparatively  new  arrival 
among  us,  but  we  are  children  in  his  sight  when 
it  comes  to  experience  of  actual  fighting.  Our  own 
commander  has  gone  home  sick,  and  Colonel 
Graham  reigns  in  his  stead.  He  is  a  regular  of  the 
old  school.  Soldiering  is  the  breath  of  his  nostrils, 
and  the  Army  is  his  father  and  mother.  He  has 
been  over  here  more  than  twelve  months,  and  has 
seen  much  service  with  our  Allies  farther  north. 


172  THE  LAST  MILLION 

Behold  him  in  his  headquarters,  lately  the  prop- 
erty of  some  German  gentlemen  compelled  for 
business  reasons  to  move  farther  east  —  thick-set, 
hard  as  nails,  and  twinkling  humorously  through 
his  spectacles  upon  his  battle-stained  disciples. 
Most  of  our  friends  are  present  —  but  not  all. 
Jim  Nichols  is  there;  so  is  Major  Floyd,  who  has  no 
particular  call  to  be  there  at  all,  for  we  are  within 
a  few  hundred  yards  of  the  German  front  line,  and 
we  are  to  attack  at  dawn.  It  is  now  nearly  four 
o'clock  in  the  morning. 

Another  transient  visitor  is  present  —  a  young 
officer  of  the  Air  Service,  by  name  Harvey  Blane. 
His  present  duty  is  to  maintain  connection  between 
the  forces  on  the  ground  and  the  forces  of  the  air. 
He  has  come  into  the  line  to-night  in  order  to  in- 
form the  Colonel  of  the  arrangements  concluded 
between  the  Artillery  and  the  aeroplanes  for  the 
protection  of  the  Infantry  in  the  coming  attack. 
Aviators  do  not  vary  much  as  a  class.  They  are  all 
incredibly  young;  they  are  all  endowed  with  the 
undefinable  but  clear-cut  individuality  which  comes 
to  earth-dwellers  who  have  learned  to  maintain 
themselves  in  some  other  element  —  sailors  possess 
it  in  similar  degree  —  and  they  are  all  intensely 
reticent  in  the  presence  of  laymen  about  their  ex- 
periences in  the  air.  Such  an  one  was  young  Harvey 
Blane. 

There  was  a  full  muster  of  officers  in  the  crowded 
dugout,  for  the  Colonel  was  outhning  the  morrow's 
operations,  and  pencils  were  busy.  But  Major 
Powers,  that  wise  and  kindly  Ulysses,  was  not 


THE  FOREST  OF  THE  ARGONNE     173 

there.  He  was  lying  in  one  of  a  cluster  of  newly  made 
American  graves  at  the  back  of  the  wood  which 
he  had  helped  to  capture. 
Neither  was  Boone  Cruttenden. 


CHAPTER  FIFTEEN 

THE  ELEVENTH  HOUR 

The  Colonel  was  speaking. 

"Now  listen  to  what  the  Intelligence  Report  has 
to  say  about  the  enemy's  defensive  arrangements. 

"The  road  leading  into  the  Wood  on  the  west  side 
is  said  to  be  furnished  with  tank  traps.  Well,  we 
don't  have  any  tanks  to-day,  so  we  should  worry 
about  that.  (By  the  way,  boys,  remind  me  to  tell 
you  a  story  afterwards  about  a  tank.)  All  indica- 
tions point  to  the  fact  that  the  enemy  battalion  occupy- 
ing  the  north  side  of  Lapin  Wood  —  that 's  where  we 
are  now  —  has  received  orders  to  hold  the  position  to 
the  last.  Well,  the  last  will  come,  we  hope,  about 
five-fifteen  this  morning.  When  dislodged,  it  is  prob- 
able that  the  enemy  will  fall  back  nearly  two  kilome- 
tres, in  order  to  occupy  prepared  positions  on  a  newly 
constructed  line  south  of  the  village  of  Ventreuil.  That 
need  not  worry  us,  because  we  shall  be  relieved  as 
soon  as  we  fire  him  out  of  here.  .  .  .  Now  for  ma- 
chine guns!  Nine  machine  guns  have  been  located 
between  points  A  and  B  on  the  northern  edge  of  Lapin 
Wood  —  that  is  delightful  —  distributed  as  follows 
—  Company  Officers,  get  these  down  on  your 
maps.  .  .  .  Wire.  H'm-m-m!  Three  lines  interwoven 
in  the  trees  on  north  side  of  wood,  at  distance  of  three 
metres.  Well,  wire  is  the  business  of  the  Trench 
Mortar  folks.  Trenches.  Enemy's  fire-trenches  are 
situated  along  northern  edge  of  wood.  We  have  no- 


THE  ELEVENTH  HOUR         175 

ticed  them !  Elements  of  trenches  are  visible  on  open 
ground  behind,  at  points  .  .  .  Take  this  down,  please. 
.  .  .  Miscellaneous.  Bois  des  Loups.  Flashes  have 
been  observed  in  this  wood.  They  certainly  have! 
Careful  observation  of  the  angle  of  fall  and  sound- 
ranging  reports  lead  to  the  conclusion  that  there  are  at 
least  three  batteries  of  Seventy-sevens  there,  together 
icith  two  or  three  heavy  mortars.  Well,  I  guess  our 
Artillery  will  take  care  of  that." 

The  Colonel  looked  up  from  the  Report  and 
wiped  his  spectacles,  which  had  grown  dim  in  the 
humid  atmosphere  of  the  dugout. 

"Machine  guns  will  be  our  chief  snag,  I  guess," 
he  observed.  "Talking  of  machine  guns,  just  how 
badly  was  Boone  Cruttenden  hit  last  week?" 

"Shrapnel  in  the  right  shoulder,  sir,"  replied 
Jim  Nichols.  "Not  very  serious,  I  believe." 
He  was  gotten  away  all  right,  I  hope?" 
Yes.  His  own  men  brought  him  back." 

"He  did  a  fine  piece  of  work,"  said  the  Colonel. 
"But  I  want  the  names  of  all  concerned,  for  citation. 
How  did  Boone  and  his  bunch  manage  to  get  into 
that  machine-gun  nest  at  all?  I  have  had  no  time 
to  go  through  the  official  report  yet.  Did  he  creep 
around  behind  and  catch  them  napping,  or  what?" 

"Partly  that,  sir.  But  what  helped  most  was  the 
action  of  a  single  enlisted  man.  We  were  lying  in 
a  belt  of  trees.  A  clearing  lay  between  us  and  the 
German  line,  which  was  less  than  two  hundred 
yards  away.  The  machine-gun  nest  was  on  our  left 
front,  and  commanded  the  clearing." 

"Yes,  yes,  I  get  that.  Go  on!" 


li  ■ 


176  THE  LAST  MILLION 

''Boone  and  his  party,"  continued  Jim,  ''had 
been  gone  about  twenty  minutes  on  their  detour 
through  the  undergrowth  which  was  to  cut  out  this 
nest.  We  were  lying  along  the  edge  of  the  clearing, 
ready  to  make  a  supporting  bayonet  rush  if  Boone 
got  in  among  them.  At  what  I  thought  was  the 
right  moment  I  passed  the  word  down  the  line  for 
the  men  to  be  ready.  And  then  —  and  then  — " 

"Well?" 

"And  then,  sir,  the  darndest  thing  you  ever 
saw!"  proclaimed  Jim,  breaking  away  from  strict 
technicahties  in  his  emotion.  "One  of  my  men 
jumped  suddenly  to  his  feet  and  charged  out  into 
the  middle  of  the  clearing.  He  had  a  little  flag  — 
oiu-  flag  —  on  the  end  of  his  bayonet,  and  he  acted 
like  he  was  stark  insane." 

"Who  was  the  man?" 

"His  name  was  Smithers.  Miss  Sissy  Smithers, 
the  boys  called  him.  He  was  a  sissy,  in  his  ways, 
usually." 

"And  what  did  he  do?" 

"He  stood  there  shouting  to  the  enemy  to  come 
out  and  fight.  He  yelled,  —  '  I  see  you,  you  Dutch- 
men! You  Squareheads!  You  Slobs!  Look  at  me! 
Look  at  this  li'l  old  Flag!  Fire  on  that  if  you  dare!' 
Then  he  held  his  rifle  up  high,  with  the  Stars  and 
Stripes  on  the  end  of  it." 

There  ran  a  sudden  thrill  around  the  crowded 
table.  The  American  venerates  his  Flag  in  a  fashion 
hardly  comprehended  by  the  Englishman.  Every 
nation  must  worship  aome  totem.  In  the  English- 
man this  impulse  finds  vent  in  loyalty  to  the  Crown. 


THE  ELEVENTH  HOUR  177 

We  love  the  Union  Jack,  and  we  salute  it  upon 
state  occasions.  But  we  take  off  our  hats  to  the 
King,  and  pray  God  to  save  him,  because  he  stands 
for  a  tradition  that  goes  right  back  a  thousand 
years  and  more.  The  American  pins  everything  — 
national  honor,  national  tradition,  personal  loyalty, 
everything  —  to  Old  Glory. 

"Well?"  enquired  the  Colonel  —  presently. 

''For  a  moment,"  pursued  Nichols,  "the  enemy 
did  nothing.  He  was  kind  of  paralyzed,  I  guess. 
Then  the  machine  guns  in  that  nest  spoke  up,  and 
poor  Smithers  went  down.  Even  then  he  was  only 
hit  in  the  legs.  He  sat  up,  and  waved  his  flag  again. 
Then  they  got  him  in  the  body,  and  he  fell  on  his 
back.  But  he  managed  to  keep  his  rifle  erect  for 
another  fifteen  seconds  or  so.  He  shouted,  too,  as 
he  lay  —  calHng  them  cowards,  and  daring  them 
to  come  and  take  the  Flag.  By  that  time  the  guns 
were  trained  right  on  him,  and  —  he  passed  out. 
But"  —  Nichols's  voice  rose  again  exultantly  — 
"they  had  been  so  busy  trying  to  fix  poor  Sissy 
that  they  never  thought  to  look  around  behind 
them;  and  right  then  Boone  and  his  bunch  jumped 
in  on  their  necks,  and  the  nest  was  out  of  business 
for  keeps!  We  went  across  with  the  supporting 
party  and  helped  them  clean  up.  Turned  their  own 
machine  guns  on  them  too,  until  a  German  field 
battery  got  to  work  on  us." 

"I  suppose  that  was  when  you  got  most  of  your 
casualties?"  said  the  Colonel. 

"Yes,  sir.  Two  men  killed,  besides  Smithers,  and 
Boone  and  seven  others  wounded.  The  men  were  all 


178  THE  LAST  MILLION 

fine.  After  the  shelling  died  down  at  dusk,  and  we 
were  settling  into  our  new  positions,  two  or  three 
Huns  who  knew  a  little  English  started  to  josh  us; 
explained  how  they  were  coming  over  presently  to 
turn  us  out,  and  beat  us  up,  and  show  themselves 
a  time  generally.  Finally  one  of  our  men,  called 
McCarthy,  pushed  his  head  over  the  sandbags,  and 
yelled:  'Aw,  what's  the  use  of  pulhng  that  stuff? 
Is  this  a  War,  or  a  Chautauqua? '  That  fixed  them. 
I  guess  McCarthy  had  stepped  right  outside  their 
vocabulary!" 

''Great  boys,  great  boys!"  chuckled  the  Colonel. 
"They  were  just  the  same  on  the  Hindenburg 
Line."  He  turned  to  Floyd.  "  Our  idioms  there  puz- 
zled some  of  our  British  friends,  Major.  But  be- 
tween us  we  got  the  goods  on  old  man  Hindenburg, 
I  fancy." 

"1  have  heard  rumours  to  that  effect.  Colonel," 
replied  Floyd.  "The  cooperation  was  pretty  good, 
eh?" 

'Tt  was  great,"  said  the  Colonel.  "French,  Brit- 
ish, or  American,  it  did  not  seem  to  matter  who 
was  in  command.  We  all  kept  touch,  and  we  all 
made  our  objectives.  And  team-work!  Here  is  a 
letter  I  received  from  an  Australian  commander 
under  whom  we  worked  for  quite  a  while.  He  was 
a  busy  man,  but  he  found  time  to  write  me  this." 

The  Colonel  produced  a  frayed  field-despatch 
from  the  breast  pocket  of  his  tunic,  and  read: 

I  desire  to  take  the  opportunity  of  tendering  to  you,  as 
their  immediate  commander,  my  earnest  thanks  for  the 
assistance  and  service  of  the  four  companies  of  Infantry 


THE  ELEVENTH  HOUR         179 

who  participated  in  yesterday's  brilliant  operations.  The 
dash,  gallantry,  and  efficiency  of  these  American  troops 
left  nothing  to  be  desired,  and  my  Australian  soldiers  speak 
in  the  very  highest  terms  in  praise  of  them. 

"There  is  some  more,"  added  the  Colonel,  ''but 
that  will  be  sufficient  to  show  you  what  that  Gen- 
eral thought  of  my  boys.  The  Australians  have  a 
pretty  high  standard  of  their  own,  and  they  don't 
pin  orchids  on  other  people  unnecessarily.  So  we 
appreciated  this."  He  tapped  the  despatch.  ''The 
fact  is,  we  were  a  band  of  brothers.  The  only  occa- 
sion upon  which  we  indulged  in  anything  like  cere- 
mony or  company  manners  was  on  the  Fourteenth 
of  July.  (Corresponds  to  our  Fourth.)  I  went  along 
with  a  few  others  to  represent  the  Americans  at  a 
swell  lunch  which  was  to  be  given  in  the  Town  Hall 
of  Amiens  in  honor  of  the  occasion.  Amiens  was 
under  shell-fire  at  the  time  —  right  in  view  of  the 
enemy,  who  were  up  on  the  high  ground  back  of 
Villers  Brettoneux,  not  ten  miles  away.  But  no  one 
worried.  We  had  our  lunch  in  a  cellar  —  French, 
British,  Australian,  and  American  officers.  Some 
lunch!  There  were  flowers  on  the  table,  too.  Flow- 
ers! God  knows  where  they  came  from.  But  that's 
France  —  just  France!  They  had  to  have  them! 
Speeches,  too,  by  Senators  from  Paris.  Speeches, 
with  German  shells  bursting  in  the  street  outside ! 
They're  a  great  nation!" 

"How  did  the  British  Tonamy  and  the  Dough- 
boy get  along?"  inquired  Floyd. 

Colonel  Graham's  frosty  eyes  twinkled. 
'Each  took  a  little  while,"  he  said,  "to  get  the 


iC 


180  THE  LAST  MILLION 

combination  of  the  other.  You  see,  Major,  we 
Americans  consider  ourselves  the  greatest  nation 
on  earth;  and  being  Americans,  we  have  to  say  so. 
Perhaps  you  have  noticed  that?" 

''I  have,"  assented  Floyd,  ''and  I  have  lived  in 
America  long  enough  to  learn  to  like  hearing  you 
say  so.  I  like  the  young  American's  passionate 
affection  for  his  country  and  all  her  institutions, 
and  his  fixed  determination  to  boost  everything 
connected  with  her.  The  other  day  I  was  waiting 
in  a  village  for  an  American  Staff  car  which  was 
being  sent  for  me  from  Chaumont.  I  found  one 
standing  at  the  corner  of  the  street,  so  I  asked  the 
chauffeur,  thinking  he  might  be  from  headquarters, 
—  'Where  are  you  from?'  And  he  sat  up,  and  re- 
plied, all  in  one  breath,  as  if  I  had  pressed  a  button, 
— '  Sir,  I  am  from  Marion,  Ohio,  the  Greatest 
Steam-Shovel  Producing  Centre  in  the  World ! '  — 
Just  like  that.  That  is  what  I  call  the  right  spirit. 
But  I  am  interrupting  you.  Colonel." 

"You  British,  on  the  other  hand,"  resumed  the 
Colonel,  "also  consider  yourselves  the  greatest 
nation  upon  earth,  but  you  do  not  say  so  to  people, 
because  you  take  it  for  granted  that  they  know 
already!" 

"A  palpable  hit,  sir!"  conceded  Floyd,  amid 
laughter. 

"Well,"  continued  the  Colonel,  "those  two 
points  of  view  required  quite  a  little  adjustment, 
in  the  first  place.  Then  again,  there  was  a  certain 
amount  of  '  We-have-come-to-win-this-War-f or- 
you'  stuff  from  our  boys,  and  a  certain  amount 


THE  ELEVENTH  HOUR         181 

of  '  You-have-been-a-darned-long-while-making-up 
your-minds-about-it '  stuff  from  yours;  and  all 
these  little  corners  had  to  be  rounded  off.  On  top 
of  that  there  was  a  lot  of  very  insidious,  very 
clever  work  by  German  agencies,  to  make  trouble 
between  them.  But  you  know  about  that.  Then, 
they  suffered  from  the  handicap  of  a  common  lan- 
guage. Believe  me,  it's  a  darned  sight  easier  to 
keep  on  clubby  terms  with  an  ally  whose  language 
you  don't  know  than  an  ally  whose  language  you 
do!  But  they  are  wise  to  one  another  now.  Each 
has  learned  to  respect  and  tolerate  the  other's  point 
of  view.  Of  course  they  don't  understand  one 
another;  and  never  will.  In  that  respect  they  are 
three  thousand  miles  and  several  centuries  apart. 
So  they  tacitly  agreed  to  regard  one  another  as 
crazy,  but  likeable  —  and  leave  it  at  that.  In  my 
view  that  is  about  as  far  as  Anglo-American  senti- 
ment will  ever  get;  and  I  shall  be  glad  and  satis- 
fied if  we  here,  who  know,  can  maintain  it  at  that 
standard  —  and  it 's  a  higher  standard  than  would 
appear  at  first  sight.  But  I  am  talking  too  much. 
Where  was  I?" 

''You  were  going  to  tell  us  a  story  about  a  tank, 
sir,"  announced  a  respectful  voice. 

"Was  I?  Well,  I  might  as  well,  for  we  can  do 
nothing  at  this  moment  but  wait.  Up  north,  in 
September,  my  outfit  were  attacking  day  after  day, 
with  an  escort  of  British  tanks.  The  Germans  were 
scared  to  death  of  those  tanks.  They  did  every- 
thing to  stop  them  —  brought  up  field  guns  to 
point-blank  range;  dug  deep  ditches,  sprung  land 


182  THE  LAST  MILLION 

mines,  and  everything.  The  tanks  suffered;  but 
they  never  weakened,  and  most  of  them  arrived  at 
their  objective.  Their  crews  were  marvels,  and  as 
for  the  children  who  commanded  them,  they  were 
the  cunningest  little  things  you  ever  saw.  One  day 
we  were  detailed  to  carry  a  village,  lying  just  back 
of  a  wood.  We  got  there  in  the  course  of  time,  rather 
more  easily  than  I  had  expected.  When  our  men 
reached  the  little  market-square,  the  reason  re- 
vealed itself,  in  the  form  of  a  British  tank,  squat- 
ting plumb  in  the  centre,  having  beaten  us  to  it 
by  four  minutes.  The  usual  infant  was  in  charge, 
sitting  on  the  top  and  twirling  the  place  where  he 
hoped  one  day  to  raise  a  mustache.  When  he  saw 
our  senior  Major  doubling  down  the  street  at  the 
head  of  our  men,  he  scrambled  down  and  saluted 
very  smart  and  proper,  and  said:  'Major,  I  hereby 
hand  over  this  village  to  you,  as  my  superior  officer, 
with  cordial  compliments,  world  without  end. 
Amen! '  —  or  words  to  that  effect.  The  Major  sa- 
luted back,  very  polite,  and  thanked  him.  Then  the 
child  said,  kind  of  thoughtfully,  jerking  his  head 
towards  the  grinning  Tommies  who  were  peeking 
out  of  the  inside  of  the  machine:  'Still,  we  wish 
somehow,  don't  you  know,  that  we  had  something 
to  show  —  just  to  show,  sir,  that  we  were  here  first.' 
The  Major  thought  a  minute.  Then  he  said,  'I  can 
fix  that  for  you.  I'll  give  you  a  receipt  for  the  vil- 
lage.' And  he  did!"  concluded  the  Colonel,  amid  a 
rising  tide  of  laughter:  " Received  from  officer  com- 
manding British  Tank,  '  Bing  Boy,'  one  village  — 
in  poor  condition.'' 


THE  ELEVENTH  HOUR         183 

A  salvo  of  German  five-point-nine  shells  deto- 
nated amid  the  tree-roots  far  above  theu-  heads. 

"Enemy  getting  nervous,"  commented  the 
Colonel.  "Let  him  wait!  Our  artillery  preparation 
is  n't  due  for  an  hour  or  more.  Now,  do  you  boys 
understand  your  orders?  Any  questions  to  ask? 
If  so,  shoot!  That's  what  I'm  here  for." 

He  answered  one  or  two  eleventh-hour  inquiries, 
and  added:  "Make  the  most  of  this  attack.  You 
may  not  have  another  opportunity." 

"You  mean,"  suggested  Floyd,  "that  this  battle 
is  going  to  peter  out?" 

"I  mean,"  replied  Colonel  Graham  deliber- 
ately, "that  this  war  is  going  to  peter  out!  And," 
he  added,  with  sudden  concentrated  bitterness, 
"if  it  does  —  now  —  we  Americans  are  going  to 
regret  it  for  the  rest  of  our  history!" 

The  figures  round  the  table  sat  up  —  quite  liter- 
ally. But  one  or  two  of  the  older  men  nodded  their 
heads. 

"  If  only  we  could  be  allowed  to  go  on  for  another 
three  months!"  pursued  the  Colonel  earnestly. 
"If  only  this  great  beautiful  machine  of  an  Ameri- 
can Army  could  be  given  a  chance  to  climb  to  its 
top  speed !  Then  we  should  be  functioning  in  proper 
shape  —  with  our  own  guns,  and  our  own  tanks, 
plenty  of  horse-transport,  and  sufficient  airplanes 
to  direct  our  own  fire  and  locate  the  enemy's.  We 
should  be  employing  acquired  experience  instead 
of  borrowed  experience.  We  should  have  a  trained 
Staff.  We  could  send  these  great-hearted  boys  of 
ours  into  action  adequately  protected  by  a  per- 


184  THE  LAST  MILLION 

fectly  timed  barrage.  We  could  cut  down  our 
casualties  seventy-five  per  cent,  and  make  future 
victories  a  real  matter  for  rejoicing.  Of  course  it 
won't  matter  to  the  folks  at  home.  They  have 
no  opportunity  to  discriminate.  They  would  cheer 
themselves  hoarse  over  us  if  we  were  a  Sanitary 
Section  from  the  Base.  But  —  we  should  like  to 
show  our  friends  over  here  what  the  American  Army 
really  is  and  not  merely  what  it  is  going  to  be. 
And  —  we  could  extract  some  sort  of  adequate  in- 
terest from  the  capital  —  the  capital  of  our  men's 
lives  —  that  we  have  been  sinking  in  this  year's 
campaign.  But  there  is  n't  time!  There  is  n't  time!" 
The  old  soldier's  gnarled  fist  dropped  despairingly 
upon  the  trestle  table.  *'We  are  still  on  our  second 
speed,  and  however  hard  we  may  step  on  the  gas, 
we  can't  get  real  results  for  a  little  while  to  come. 
There  is  n't  time!" 

There  was  a  pause,  while  another  salvo  burst 
overhead.  Then  Jim  Nichols  asked :  — 

''Colonel,  just  why  are  you  so  sure?  Is  Peace 
really  on  the  way?" 

(Certainly,  the  question  was  worth  asking. 
Within  the  past  five  days  the  following  rumours 
have  reached  us,  seriatim,  supported  by  every 
variety  of  unreliable  testimony :  — 

(1)  Austria  is  trying  to  quit. 

(2)  The  German  Fleet  has  come  out  and  sur- 
rendered. 

_  (3)  Kiel  is  in  the  hands  of  mutineers. 
(4)  The  Kaiser  and  the  Crown  Prince  have 
abdicated. 


THE  ELEVENTH  HOUR         185 

(5)  Germany  has  asked  for  Peace,  and  Foch  has 
given  her  seventy- two  hours  to  accept  his  terms.) 

"Not  peace,"  replied  the  Colonel,  "nor  anything 
like  it.  But  an  armistice  may  come  any  day.  From 
all  accounts  the  Hun  is  willing  to  submit  to  almost 
any  terms  so  long  as  he  can  get  out  now,  while  the 
going  is  any  good  at  all.  That  looks  as  if  his  military 
discipline  were  growing  shaky  —  or  else  his  civil- 
ian morale.  Perhaps  both.  Anyway,  he  seems  sus- 
piciously anxious  to  quit.  The  real  question  is. 
What  are  we  going  to  do  about  it?" 

"I  fancy  we  are  going  to  accede  to  his  request," 
said  Floyd.  "In  all  probability,  if  we  hanamered 
him  for  another  six  w^eeks  or  so,  we  should  have 
him  in  such  a  state  that  only  a  vacuum-cleaner 
could  clear  up  the  mess.  We  should  probably  take 
a  million  prisoners.  We  could  sit  down  upon  the 
Boche's  prostrate  carcass  and  dictate  any  terms 
we  pleased.  But  —  but  —  but  —  well,  there  might 
be  a  miscarriage.  We  might  find  ourselves  com- 
mitted to  another  year's  campaigning.  Labour,  so- 
called,  is  getting  fed  up,  and,  though  we  are  driving 
the  Huns  before  us  like  sheep,  an  avoidable  casu- 
alty-list might  produce  a  crisis  in  that  quarter. 
As  you  say.  Colonel,  the  big  American  machine  is 
running  more  smoothly  and  powerfully  every  day; 
but  France  and  Britain  are  down  to  a  pretty  fine 
edge  now." 

"But  your  men  and  the  French  are  all  veterans. 
Major,"  exclaimed  Jim  Nichols:  "the  finest 
material  — " 

"That  is  just  the  trouble,"  said  Floyd,  shaking 


186  THE  LAST  MILLION 

his  head.  'Tn  this  crazy  war  veterans  are  no  use. 
To-day  experience  simply  means  loss  of  nerve. 
The  most  effective  —  the  only  effective  —  troops 
in  this  kind  of  warfare  are  young,  green,  ignorant 
recruits,  and  the  British  and  French  have  precious 
few  of  that  type  left.  They  all  know  too  much  now! 
Moreover,  the  people  at  home  are  suffering  badly. 
They  have  not  too  much  to  eat,  and  the  casualty- 
list  is  approaching  the  three-million  mark.  They 
are  not  kicking:  they  are  prepared  to  go  on  for 
another  twenty  years  if  national  security  demands 
it:  but  it  is  the  sacrifice  of  the  last  few  lives  in  a 
war  at  which  national  conscience  boggles,  and  I 
fancy  that  if  our  statesmen  see  a  chance  of  a  vic- 
torious peace  they  will  grab  it." 

''I  am  afraid  you  are  right.  Major,"  sighed  the 
Colonel.  "Looks  as  if  we  were  going  to  weaken  on 
the  proposition  of  the  knock-out  blow.  If  we  do, 
two  things  are  going  to  happen.  First,  hundreds 
and  thousands  of  American  boys  over  at  home  are 
going  to  break  their  hearts.  Think  of  it!  Months 
and  months  of  hard  training  and  feverish  anticipa- 
tion in  those  big  dreary  camps.  Then  —  on  their 
top  note  of  anticipation  —  Peace !  Demobilization ! 
Reaction !  Instead  of  soldiers  —  and  remember  the 
title  '  soldier '  is  the  proudest  in  the  world !  —  with 
a  record  of  duty  done  and  victory  achieved,  we 
shall  have  created  a  few  million  disgruntled, 
unemployed,  unemployable  might-have-beens  — 
robbed,  robbed,  of  their  fair  share  in  the  greatest 
Adventure  that  life  can  offer!" 

''Still,"  rejoined  Floyd,  "you  can  honestly  tell 


THE  ELEVENTH  HOUR         187 

them  this :  When  the  credit  for  the  victories  of  this 
summer  comes  to  be  apportioned,  a  big  share  must 
go  to  troops  which  have  never  set  foot  in  France  — 
which  have  never  even  had  the  chance  to  leave 
America :  because  it  was  the  promise  of  their  pres- 
ence that  enabled  Foch  to  take  the  offensive  right 
away  —  to  take  chances,  in  fact,  which  would  have 
been  utterly  impossible  if  he  had  not  known  that  he 
had  the  whole  trained  manhood  of  America  behind 
him.  So  their  labour  was  not  altogether  in  vain,  you 
see!" 

But  the  old  war-horse  refused  to  be  comforted. 

"We  ought  to  go  on,  Major,"  he  said  doggedly. 
"That  brings  me  to  the  other  thing  I  said  was 
going  to  happen.  America,  as  a  whole,  has  not  yet 
felt  this  War :  and  she  must,  if  she  is  to  extract  from 
it  the  benefit  that  belongs  to  her  by  right.  What 
are  a  quarter  of  a  million  casualties  to  a  nation  the 
size  of  ours?  We  ought  to  suffer  some  more,  if  only 
to  save  us  from  unreadiness  and  mismanagement 
in  the  future.  If  we  stop  now,  all  that  we  shall  have 
won  will  be  the  opportunity  —  and  you  know  how 
our  orators  and  patriotism-mongers  will  use  it  — 
to  announce  that  America  just  stepped  in,  and  the 
War  was  won!  It  may  be  true;  it  may  not;  but  that 
line  of  talk  never  did  any  good  to  any  nation.  We 
here  round  this  table  all  know  that,  and  there  are 
thousands  of  folk  at  home  who  know  it  too.  Yes,  we 
ought  to  get  deeper  in.  God  knows,  no  one  wants 
to  make  widows  and  orphans.  But  a  war,  however 
bloody,  which  teaches  a  nation  its  own  weaknesses, 
is  worth  while.  Individuals  suffer,  as  individuals 


188  THE  LAST  MILLION 

must  and  do;  but  the  commonwealth  gains.  It  is 
true  we  are  losing  good  Americans  by  the  hundred 
to-day;  but  we  are  making  thousands  more.  Listen. 
A  few  weeks  ago  I  was  in  a  Field  Dressing-Station, 
talking  to  the  wounded.  One  man  replied  to  my 
enquiries  in  a  strong  foreign  accent.  He  was  a 
splendid-looking  boy  —  a  Dane,  I  guess.  I  asked 
him:  'What  nationahty  are  you?'  He  looked  just 
the  least  bit  surprised,  and  replied:  'American, 
sure!'  I  said:  T  can  see  that,  son:  but  tell  me,  what 
made  you  an  American? '  And  he  laid  his  hand  on 
a  great  whale  of  a  wound  in  his  side,  and  he  said, 
quite  simply :  '  That  made  me  an  American ! '  And 
that  is  what  this  War  is  doing  for  our  big,  beloved, 
half -grown  country  —  making  Americans !  And 
now  we've  got  to  quit!" 

"Still,"  smiled  Floyd,  ''you  have  made  a  good 
many.  You  have  a  couple  of  million  of  them  over 
here  now,  and  they  will  form  a  very  useful  leaven 
when  they  get  home  again.  He  is  a  great  man,  your 
Doughboy,  Colonel.  I  have  been  privileged  to  make 
his  acquaintance,  and  I  have  seen  him  fight :  and  I 
take  off  my  tin  hat  to  him,  because  I  know  what  his 
difficulties  have  been.  When  he  gets  home  he  will 
no  doubt  be  smothered  in  praise  —  by  people  inca- 
pable of  discriminating  between  the  easy  and  the 
difficult  things  that  he  did.  But  he  will  deserve  all 
that  he  gets,  and  more,  on  account  of  the  difficulties 
he  overcame  which  people  at  home  know  nothing 
about  —  the  things  that  never  get  into  the  papers." 

There  was  a  sympathetic  murmur  from  the  com- 
pany. The  Colonel  nodded. 


THE  ELEVENTH  HOUR  189 

''You  are  right,  Major,"  he  said  cheerfully. 
"Meanwhile,  I  wish  to  report  that  I  feel  much 
better.  I  needed  that  outburst  badly.  Moreover, 
I  don't  say  that  I  have  any  particular  personal 
objection  to  a  spell  of  Peace.  I  guess  we  can  all  do 
with  a  vacation.  How  will  you  celebrate  your  first 
day,  Major?  " 

*T  don't  know,"  replied  Floyd  thoughtfully. 
''The  idea  of  Peace  does  not  particularly  appeal  to 
me  in  my  present  frame  of  mind.  More  than  three 
quarters  of  a  million  of  my  fellow-countrymen 
have  been  killed  during  the  past  four  years  — 
most  of  them  in  their  early  twenties  —  and  at  my 
time  of  life  I  feel  almost  ashamed  to  be  alive.  And 
the  idea  of  'settling  down'  does  not  altogether 
attract  me,  either.  As  you  very  rightly  observe, 
Colonel,  the  community  may  benefit  by  a  good 
searching  war,  but,  by  God!  individuals  suffer. 
Especially  if  they  happen  to  be  of  that  misguided 
type  which  hastens  to  get  into  the  scrap  first,  while 
wiser  persons  are  deciding  whether  to  volunteer  or 
be  fetched.  That  was  when  I  lost  my  friends  —  in 
nineteen-fourteen  and  fifteen.  That  stratum  of  our 
community  has  almost  ceased  to  exist.  My  own 
Battalion  has  been  replaced  —  which  means  wiped 
out  —  thirteen  times  in  four  years,  and  I,  even  I, 
only  am  left.  So  I  view  the  prospect  of  settling 
down  with  mixed  feelings.  Tell  us  how  you  propose 
to  spend  the  first  day  of  the  Armistice,  Colonel  — 
when  it  comes!" 

"I?"  said  the  Colonel.  "I  shall  start  by  sending 
a  cable  to  the  best  little  woman  in  America,  in  a 


190  THE  LAST  MILLION 

little  town  in  Tennessee  that  you  never  heard  of, 
Major;  telling  her  that  I  have  come  through,  and 
that  she  and  the  bunch  of  marauders  that  belong 
to  both  of  us  —  we  have  two  boys  and  two  girls  — 
can  quit  worrying.  Then  I  shall  sit  down  and  am- 
plify my  sentiments  in  a  letter.  But  I  am  old  and 
sentimental.  What  will  you  do,  Jim  Nichols?" 

'T  guess  I'll  muster  the  Battalion,"  replied  the 
newly  promoted  and  zealous  second  in  command, 
"and  have  them  clean  up  their  rifles  and  equip- 
ment. They're  in  a  terrible  mess,  after  the  time 
we've  been  having." 

"Well,  well!  We'll  try  some  one  less  wedded  to 
his  duty!"  laughed  the  Colonel.  ''What  will  you 
do,  boy?"  He  turned  to  the  youthful  aviator. 

Master  Harvey  Blane  meditated.  He  had  twice 
been  wounded,  once  brought  down  in  flames,  and 
several  times  driven  down  out  of  control. 

"I  guess,"  he  said  at  last,  'T  shall  go  along  down 
to  the  airdrome,  and  order  out  my  machine,  and 
have  the  boys  tune  her  up  very  carefully.  Then  I 
shall  have  her  wheeled  out,  and  I  shall  climb  on 
board  and  test  all  the  contacts.  Then  I  shall  run  the 
engine  for  a  spell,  and  maybe  take  a  turn  around 
the  airdrome,  along  the  ground.  Then  I  shall  load 
up  with  bombs.  Then  I  shall  look  up  in  the  sky, 
and  say:  'Boys,  I  don't  think  after  all  I  feel  like 
going  out  to-day.  Run  her  back  and  put  her  to 
bed!'" 

There  was  appreciative  laughter  at  this,  and 
Floyd  said : 

"That  reminds  me  of  an  English  subaltern  of  my 


THE  ELEVENTH  HOUR         191 

acquaintance  who  came  home  for  a  week's  leave 
after  four  continuous  months  in  the  Salient,  in 
nineteen-fifteen  —  and  after  that  experience  one 
required  a  little  leave !  He  took  a  room  at  the  Savoy 
and  left  certain  explicit  instructions  with  the  night 
clerk  about  the  time  he  was  to  be  called.  In  due 
course,  at  three  o'clock  in  the  morning,  the  tele- 
phone beside  his  bed  rang,  and  our  friend  sat  up 
and  answered  it.  The  voice  of  the  clerk  said: 
'Colonel's  compliments,  sir,  and  he  wants  you  in 
the  firing- trench  inmaediately.'  And  the  child 
replied:  'Give  my  compliments  to  the  Colonel,  and 
request  him  to  go  to  Hell ! '  Then  he  rolled  over  and 
slept  till  the  afternoon.  His  real  leave  had  begun! 
He  was  an  artist  like  yourself,  Blane!" 

As  Floyd  concluded  this  highly  probable  anec- 
dote, in  his  usual  sepulchral  tone,  a  signal  orderly 
came  down  the  steps  that  led  to  the  regions  above, 
and  handed  a  despatch  to  the  Adjutant. 

Colonel  Graham  glanced  affectionately  around 
the  table. 

"I  hope  you  boys  will  all  be  in  a  position  soon  to 
send  me  such  a  message!"  he  said.  "But  only  for  a 
week  or  two,  mind!  Leave,  not  Demobilization. 
We  have  n't  finished  the  War  yet." 

The  Adjutant  handed  him  the  despatch.  Colonel 
Graham  adjusted  his  glasses,  read  it,  and  looked 
up. 

"Yes,  we  have,"  he  said.  "The  rumours  were 
true.  German  delegates  are  to  meet  Allied  dele- 
gates at  five  o'clock  this  morning,  when  the  Allied 
terms  will  be  dictated.  Dictated,  not  discussed!" 


192  THE  LAST  MILLION 

He  glanced  at  his  wrist-watch.  ''They  are  being 
dictated  at  this  moment.  Boys,  we  are  through! 
For  better  or  worse,  we  are  through  with  this  War! 
Countermand  the  attack." 


CHAPTER  SIXTEEN 

GALLIA  VICTRIX 

Lastly,  two  friends  of  ours  in  Paris. 

This  is  an  unsatisfactory  world,  and  our  desti- 
nies are  not  always  controlled  as  we  could  wish.  But 
occasionally  —  just  once  or  twice,  maybe,  in  a 
lifetime  —  something  happens  (or  is  arranged  for 
us)  which  so  utterly  transcends  our  own  dreams 
and  deserts  as  to  restore  our  faith  in  an  All- Wise 
and  All-Benevolent  Providence  once  and  for  all. 

Frances  Lane  had  been  transferred  to  a  military 
hospital  in  Paris.  Here  she  discharged,  cheerfully 
and  efficiently,  those  minor  and  unheroic  duties 
which  the  professional  healer  is  accustomed  to 
depute  to  the  amateur. 

One  morning,  during  the  last  week  in  October, 
she  was  called  upon  in  the  ordinary  course  of  busi- 
ness to  sit  by  the  bedside  of  a  young  officer  who  had 
just  been  wheeled  from  the  operating-room,  until 
such  time  as  he  should  ''come  out  of  the  ether." 
And  the  young  officer  was  Boone  Cruttenden. 
Hence  the  foregoing  appreciative  reference  to  the 
workings  of  Providence. 

Boone  duly  emerged  from  one  form  of  oblivion 
to  enter  upon  another,  hardly  less  complete.  In 
the  first,  he  had  been  oblivious  to  everything.  In 
the  second,  he  was  oblivious  to  everything  and 
everybody   save   Frances.    The   malady   proved 


194  THE  LAST  MILLION 

catching,  and  both  patients  imagined,  as  usual, 
that  their  symptoms  were  undetected  by  the  out- 
side world.  So  the  War  had  to  take  care  of  itself 
for  a  while. 

At  the  eleventh  hour  of  the  eleventh  day  of  the 
eleventh  month  of  the  year  nineteen-eighteen 
these  twain  found  themselves  wandering  side  by 
side  —  with  Frances  on  the  right,  ferociously  inter- 
posing her  slim  person  between  Boone's  strapped 
and  bandaged  arm  and  the  rest  of  humanity  — 
through  the  congested  Boulevards;  waiting,  wait- 
ing, like  every  one  else,  for  Something  Official  to 
be  announced. 

During  the  previous  day  tout  Paris,  in  Sabbath 
attire,  had  roamed  restlessly,  silently,  expectantly, 
about  the  streets.  Night  had  fallen,  and  the  throng 
had  not  abated.  The  great  city  was  as  murky  as 
ever.  Peace  might  be  hovering  in  the  air,  but  War 
precautions  still  prevailed  on  earth.  Small,  ghostly, 
electric  lights,  encased  in  dark-blue  glass,  still 
indicated  rather  than  illuminated  the  wayfarer's 
path.  At  intervals  a  discreet,  faintly  luminous  sign, 
bearing  the  legend  Abri,  proffered  a  refuge  from 
the  terror  that  flies  by  night.  Through  this  gross 
darkness,  silently,  furtively,  the  great  concourse 
drifted  and  groped.  Only  over  La  Place  de  la  Con- 
corde, like  the  promise  of  victorious  Dawn,  the  sky 
was  bright  with  the  lights  newly  unveiled  to  illu- 
minate the  great  array  of  trophies  —  German  guns, 
German  aeroplanes,  festoons  of  German  helmets  — 
set  up  for  the  advancement  of  the  latest  War  Loan 


GALLIA  VICTRIX  195 

—  "The  Loan  of  the  Last  Quarter  of  an  Hour,"  as 
the  posters  happily  described  it. 

On  Monday  morning  the  crowd  was  still  there. 
It  had  contrived  to  shp  home  and  put  on  its  work- 
ing-clothes, but  that  was  all.  The  shops  were  open, 
but  no  one  appeared  to  be  buying  anything.  There 
was  little  sound.  Occasionally  the  most  unlikely- 
looking  persons  were  accosted  and  asked,  "On  a 
signef"  But  it  did  not  matter,  as  no  one  ever  stayed 
for  an  answer.  Paris  was  waiting. 

Then  in  a  moment,  about  the  stroke  of  eleven, 
the  electric  discharge  came.  Cries  arose  from  vari- 
ous parts  of  the  city.  The  newspaper  offices  and  in- 
formation bureaux  broke  into  simultaneous,  pre- 
concerted animation. 

In  the  Boulevard  des  Italiens,  Boone  and  Frances, 
standing  amid  a  vast  throng  facing  the  office  of 
Le  Matin,  suddenly  became  aware,  between  two 
intervals  of  whispered  confidences,  that  the  huge 
map  of  the  Western  Front  which  covered  the  outer 
wall  of  the  building,  upon  whose  surface,  through 
months  of  alternate  agony  and  triumph,  the  ebb 
and  flow  of  battle  had  been  recorded  by  an  undu- 
lating array  of  tiny  flags,  was  being  obliterated  by 
a  series  of  great  printed  slips,  set  one  above  an- 
other. The  first  of  these  had  already  been  put  in 
position.  It  said: 

L' ARMISTICE  EST  SIGNEE! 

There  came  a  buzz  of  excitement  from  the 
crowd,  but  little  noise.  The  second  shp  was  going 
up:  — 


196  THE  LAST  MILLION 

LA  GUERRE  EST  GAGNEE! 

"A-a-a-ah!"  Here  was  a  new  thought.  "We  have 
won  —  won!  We  have  beaten  him  —  beaten  the 
Boche!  Enfin!''  Men  and  women  began  to  grip  one 
another's  hands.  The  confused,  uncertain  buzzing 
rose  higher,  and  the  third  slip  went  up :  — 

VIVE  LA  FRANCE! 

That  settled  it.  Next  moment  every  hat  was  in 
the  air.  This  was  what  everybody  had  been  waiting 
for.  Every  French  man,  woman,  and  child  was 
shouting,  or  crying,  or  embracing  his  neighbour. 
France !  France !  France  —  safe,  free,  victorious ! 
France ! 

The  last  strip  was  unrolled :  — 

VI VENT  LES  ALLIES! 

This  time  it  was  a  different  demonstration. 
Mingled  with  it  were  the  enthusiastic  cheers  of 
the  Parisian  —  the  glowing,  grateful  tribute  of  the 
principal  sufferer  to  the  friends  from  all  over  the 
globe  who  had  stood  by  her  so  stoutly.  But  in  the 
main  it  was  a  deep,  full-throated,  Anglo-Saxon 
roar.  In  that  crowd  stood  scores  of  British  and 
hundreds  of  American  soldiers.  Higher  and  higher 
rose  the  cheering.  They  were  not  blind  cheers. 
They  were  cheers  of  realization.  A  job  of  work  well 
and  truly  completed!  No  more  trenches!  No  more 
mud!  No  more  Hell!  No  more  death!  Victory! 
Peace !  Home !  Sweethearts  and  Wives ! 

It  was  at  this  point,  for  the  first  time,  that 
Boone  Cruttenden  kissed  Frances  Lane. 


GALLIA  VICTRIX  197 

Thereafter,  a  brief  period  of  uncertainty;  then 
Paris  settled  down  to  rejoice  in  earnest. 

It  is  not  easy  to  rejoice  suddenly  —  after  four 
and  a  half  years  of  stoical  endurance.  Still,  by 
noon,  Paris  had  settled  down  into  her  stride.  The 
midinettes  and  ouvrieres  had  come  out  for  their 
dinner-hour,  and  none  manifested  any  intention  of 
returning  to  their  labours.  In  the  balconies  outside 
the  great  millinery  shops  of  the  Rue  de  la  Paix 
lovely  creatures  in  kimonos,  of  the  mannequin 
tribe,  forgetful  of  the  whole  duty  of  a  mannequin, 
which  is  to  languish  and  glide,  were  hanging  far 
out  over  the  seething  street,  waving,  weeping,  and 
screaming  like  common  persons. 

The  city  had  broken  out  into  flags.  Every  win- 
dow sported  one.  Every  person  carried  one.  None 
of  your  miniature,  buttonhole  affairs;  but  a  good, 
flapping  tricolour,  or  Union  Jack,  or  Stars  and 
Stripes,  three  feet  square,  carried  over  the  shoulder 
on  a  pole  six  feet  long. 

Every  one  felt  it  incumbent  upon  him  to  show 
some  slight  civility  to  his  neighbour.  Soldiers 
saluted  civilians;  civilians  embraced  soldiers. 
Young  military  gentlemen  kissed  young  ladies  of 
the  dressmaking  persuasion.  Exuberant  daughters 
of  Gaul  joined  hands  and  danced  in  a  ring  round 
embarrassed  Anglo-Saxon  oflBcers,  or  tweaked  the 
tails  of  the  Glengarry  bonnets  of  passing  "Jocks." 
At  each  porte-cochere  snuffy  concierges  were  phleg- 
matically  tearing  down  the  printed  signs  tacked 
upon  the  outer  doors  —  Abri,  25  places  —  with  an 
almost  genial,  "Ei  voild!''  A  spirit  of  brotherly  love 


198  THE  LAST  MILLION 

prevailed:  Boone  and  Frances  saw  a  Paris  taxi- 
driver  distinctly  slow  down  to  avoid  running  over 
two  young  ladies  whose  cavaliers  were  playfully 
endeavouring  to  push  them  under  his  front  wheels. 

Presently  an  aged  man  in  a  blue  blouse  and  a 
species  of  yachting-cap  accosted  them. 

''Americainf"  he  demanded. 

"Oui/^  admitted  Boone  cautiously.  He  had 
already  stalled  off  more  than  one  would-be  kisser. 

"Blesse!'^  added  Frances  proudly. 

The  old  gentleman  shook  hands  with  both  of 
them,  several  times.  Tears  were  running  down  his 
cheeks. 

''Et  maintenant,"  he  told  them,  "mon  fils 
reviendra!" 

And  he  hobbled  off,  to  spread  the  great  news 
elsewhere. 

By  the  afternoon  Paris  had  resolved  itself  into 
processions,  mainly  of  soldiers  and  girls  intertwined. 
Nearly  everybody  was  singing.  The  French  sang 
the  Marseillaise,  or  Madelon.  The  English-speak- 
ing races  devoted  their  energy,  which  was  consid- 
erable, to  a  ditty  with  the  mysterious  refrain  — 

Would  you  rather  be  a  Colonel,  with  an  eagle  on  your  shoulder, 
Or  a  private,  with  a  chicken  on  your  knee  f 

Ordinary  vehicular  traffic  had  almost  entirely 
removed  itself  from  the  streets  —  probably  from 
the  instinct  of  self-preservation;  for  the  few  taxis 
which  still  survived  carried  never  less  than  fifteen 
passengers,  mostly  on  the  roof.  But  huge  military 


GALLIA  VICTRIX  199 

motor-trucks  were  ubiquitous.  They  were  mainly 
British  and  American,  but  they  bore  a  cargo  com- 
pletely representative  of  the  Franco-Italo-Anglo- 
American  entente,  from  the  impromptu  jazz-band  of 
some  thirty  artistes  perched  upon  the  canvas  roof, 
to  the  quartette  of  Australian  soldiers  and  their 
lady  friends  sitting  astride  the  radiator,  bob-sleigh 
fashion,  and  wearing  one  another's  hats.  It  is  need- 
less to  add  that  small  French  boys  adhered  like 
flies  to  all  the  less  accessible  parts  of  the  vehicle. 

As  evening  approached,  and  the  electric  arc- 
lamps  awoke  sizzling  and  sputtering  from  their 
enforced  sleep  of  many  gloomy  months,  one  ques- 
tion began  to  exercise  the  collective  faculties  of  the 
celebrants :  — 

"Where  shall  we  go  to-night?" 

In  most  cases  the  answer  was  simple  enough.  At 
moments  of  intense  mental  exaltation  the  Anglo- 
Saxon  in  Paris  turns  to  the  Folies  Bergeres  as 
simply  and  spontaneously  as  your  true  Moslem 
turns  towards  Mecca  at  the  call  of  the  muezzin. 
But  Boone  and  Frances  cared  for  none  of  these 
things. 

"Listen,  dear,"  said  Boone.  "Let's  go  to  some 
place  that's  quiet,  where  we  can  get  by  ourselves!" 

"That  will  be  too  lovely,"  agreed  the  other 
optimist,  as  she  struggled  panting  through  the 
press.  "But  where,  darling?" 

"Well,  anyway,  some  place  where  we  won't  meet 
any  one  we  know,"  said  Boone,  with  the  first  in- 
stinct of  the  newly  affianced;  and  Frances  con- 
curred. 


200  THE  LAST  MILLION 

After  dinner,  at  a  restaurant  whose  proprietor 
had  exuberantly  decided  to  celebrate  the  cessation 
of  hostilities  by  trebling  prices  all  round  —  a  dinner 
at  which  purely  private  and  domestic  plans  were 
raptly  discussed  amid  an  atmosphere  of  riotous 
publicity  —  they  went  to  a  revue. 

It  was  not  the  usual  French  wartime  revue 
for  Anglo-Saxon  consumption  —  with  syncopated 
melodies  and  Cockney  chorus-girls,  imperfectly 
disguised  as  Parisiennes.  It  was  a  revue  intime, 
intended  for  Paris  alone,  and  was  full  of  delicate 
fancies,  and  esoteric  jokes,  and  mysterious  topical 
allusions.  Boone  and  Frances  understood  possibly 
one  third  of  the  dialogue  and  one  in  a  hundred  of 
the  allusions.  But  they  enjoyed  the  revue  exceed- 
ingly. In  their  present  frame  of  mind  they  would 
have  enjoyed  a  Greenwich  Village  mystery-play, 
or  Hamlet  without  cuts. 

The  audience  was  almost  exclusively  Parisian  — 
officers  in  uniform;  fair  women  wearing  their  jewels 
for  the  first  time  in  months;  stout,  bald,  bearded 
citizens  of  the  bourgeoisie ;  here  and  there  a  British 
uniform.  But  so  far  as  our  own  particular  pair  of 
truants  could  see,  they  were  the  only  Americans 
present. 

From  the  boulevard  outside  came  the  muffled 
tramp  of  feet;  shouts  of  triumph;  coy  feminine 
shrieks;  the  honking  of  motor-horns;  the  clink  of 
cow-bells  —  all  suggestive  of  New  Year's  Eve  on 
Broadway.  But  inside  the  theatre  the  revue  flowed 
smoothly  on.  No  one  on  the  stage  made  any  allu- 
sion to  the  matter  which  was  bursting  all  hearts. 


GALLIA  VICTRIX  201 

Not  that  there  was  no  tension,  both  on  the  stage 
and  in  the  auditorium.  In  theatre-land  it  is  an  un- 
derstood thing  that  upon  occasions  of  pubHc  re- 
joicing the  actors  and  the  play  take  second  place, 
while  the  audience,  for  one  night  only,  steps  into 
the  spot-Hght  and  plays  "lead."  For  instance,  at 
this  moment,  not  many  blocks  away,  upon  the 
stage  of  the  Folies  Bergeres  a  self-appointed  band 
of  khaki-clad  enthusiasts  were  assisting  a  hysterical 
corps  de  ballet  in  the  execution  of  its  duty. 

But  the  revue  intime  pursued  its  intimate  course. 
The  piece  was  too  delicately  planned  and  executed 
to  admit  of  unauthorized  "gags"  or  inartistic  in- 
terpolations. The  audience,  being  Parisian,  realized 
this,  and  waited.  A  time  would  come.  Meanwhile, 
they  leaned  back  in  their  seats,  fanned  themselves, 
and  laughed  at  the  jokes.  But  the  fans  moved  very 
rapidly,  and  the  laughs  sounded  rather  breathless 
—  rather  like  sobs. 

Then,  suddenly,  unexpectedly,  at  the  end  of  the 
second  act,  came  the  cracking-point. 

The  scene  was  laid  in  a  restaurant.  (Not  that 
that  mattered;  a  sewing-circle  would  have  served 
equally  well.)  The  glittering  little  company  were 
already  gathered  upon  the  stage  for  the  finale. 
They  were  headed  by  the  leading  lady  —  young, 
blonde,  lovely;  a  shimmering  vision  in  silver  — 
prepared  to  burst  into  song.  The  orchestra  gave 
her  a  preliminary  chord;  she  opened  her  carmine 
lips.  And  then,  to  her  entered  from  the  wings, 
apparently  without  cue  or  authorization,  the  prin- 
cipal comedian,  in  the  role  of  the  head  waiter  of 


202  THE  LAST  MILLION 

the  restaurant  —  preposterous  weeping  whiskers 
and  all. 

He  walked  to  the  footlights,  turned  to  the  audi- 
ence, and  announced,  quite  simply:  — 

"  L' Armistice  est  signee!" 

The  thing  came  with  such  consummate  unex- 
pectedness —  the  thing  they  had  been  expecting 
all  evening  —  that  for  a  moment  no  one  stirred. 
Then,  with  a  rush,  the  audience  were  on  their  feet; 
so  were  the  orchestra.  One  long-drawn,  triumphant 
electrifying  chord  sprang  —  apparently  of  its  own 
volition  —  from  their  instruments,  and  a  tremor 
ran  through  the  theatre.  The  girl  in  silver  stepped 
forward,  and  broke  into  the  Marseillaise,  with  tears 
raining  down  her  face.  .  .  . 

''Name  of  a  name  of  a  name!"  An  old  French 
colonel,  standing  beside  Boone,  was  muttering 
brokenly  to  himself.  Boone  could  see  his  finger- 
nails whiten  as  he  grasped  the  back  of  the  seat  in 
front  of  him.  Boone  contented  himself  with  Fran- 
ces's hand,  and  together  they  gazed  up  at  the 
singer.  There  she  stood  —  slender,  radiant,  beau- 
tiful, with  not  too  much  on,  shedding  abundant, 
genuine  tears  over  an  artificial  complexion.  She 
was  Paris  —  Paris  personified  —  Paris  unclothed 
and  in  her  right  mind  —  Paris  come  to  her  own 
again. 

The  curtain  fell  —  rose  —  fell  —  rose  —  while 
the  storm  of  cheers  raged.  About  the  tenth  time  it 
rose  again,  to  stay.  The  girl  had  both  her  hands 
pressed  to  her  face,  and  her  body  was  shaking. 
But  another  chord  from  the  orchestra  —  the  same 


GALLIA  VICTRIX  203 

chord  —  steadied  her.  She  dropped  her  hands  by 
her  sides,  upUfted  her  limpid  voice,  and  sang  the 
Marseillaise  once  more. 

But  this  time  her  entourage  had  increased.  Upon 
the  outskirts  of  the  stage  —  sidUng  in  from  the 
wings,  peeping  round  the  proscenium,  mingling 
bodily  with  the  glittering,  shimmering  company 
—  there  appeared  another  throng.  Scene-shifters; 
dressers;  lusty  firemen;  brown-faced  poilus;  gen- 
darmes; mysterious  individuals  in  decayed  dress- 
suits;  little  boys  and  girls,  indicative  of  the  fact 
that  even  revue  artists  contract  domestic  ties  — 
they  all  edged  on,  and  sang  the  Marseillaise  too. 
If  the  girl  in  the  centre  was  Paris,  this  shining, 
grimy,  patient,  cheerful,  wistful,  triumphant  throng 
around  her  was  France.  France  —  with  the  black 
shadow  of  forty  years  rolled  away  from  her  horizon ! 
France  —  the  much-enduring,  the  all-surviving,  the 
indomitable;  with  her  beloved  capital  inviolate 
still,  and  her  lost  provinces  coming  back  to  her! 
Gallia  Victrix.  No  wonder  they  sang.  La  Guerre 
est  gagnee  —  at  last ! 

There  let  us  leave  them  all  —  on  the  crest  of 
the  wave.  La  Guerre  est  gagnee.  God  send  that  we 
tackle  La  Paix  as  successfully ! 


THE  END 


CAMBRIDGE   .  MASSACHUSETTS 
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